Arizona Shootings

[Lucky]

The Mickey Moosies of the world must be giddy with joy as a judge and congressperson have been shot. So far the Congressperson lives, but with what brain damage we don't know. A child was also killed, among others.

The judge himself had ruled that background checks on gun buyers were unconstitutional. Arizona is rapidly becoming the nut state, and I have no problems avoiding it.

[JKane]

I desperatly want a news organization to stand up and play clips of every single tea-bagger who every flirted with the treason of 'Second Amendment Remedies' all strung together.

That won't happen, so we'll have to wait for Stewart (or Olbermann) to do it.

[TampaYankee]

It was just a matter of time before all of these incendiary comments was going to move someone to attempt assasination. Adding guns to the mix by people parading around public event 'packing' just pour gasoline on the hyped up raw feelings.

There are many figures, public and private, with dirty hands in the era of second ammendment solutions from Tea Party individuals to talking heads and print pundits to State Governors and members of Congress.

Finally, the sherif of that Tuscon county spoke out calling a spade a spade and decried his own state being the capitol of the craziness rooted in fear hate and bigotry. Watch the usual hate mongering talking heads back away from any responsibility, intended or not, for this atmosphere. They'll blame it on a lone psycho and ignore their infammatory part in moving these nuts to action. That is the way instagtors work, from the sidelines.

[Guest zipperzone]

The neurosurgeon acting as spokesman for the hospital has said that the congresswoman's chances of survival are fairly good. But in what condition? It's hard to imagine, having had a bullet in your brain, that life as previously known is any kind of possibility. Were it me, I'd rather die than live the rest of my life as a vegetable. Hopefully, I'm wrong.

[Lucky]

I wonder is she will ever be able to use the Glock that she owns.

[RA1]

I see some are giddy with the thought that a nut case might be a right wing conservative. Also, if inflammatory remarks would lead to murder, we all would be dead, wouldn't we?

Why not have a little forbearance by waiting a bit to see what can be discovered.

Of course, the whole thing is a terrible tragedy.

Best regards,

RA1

[JKane]

Nobody in this thread said a right-wing conservative--we said a tea-bagger nutjob.

You suggest the two are one and the same?

Let's see... fundamentalist Christians, flirtations with conspiracy nuts, and now tea-baggers... is there anything dangerous the Right won't embrace in pursuit of the all-important tax cut?

What *the fuck* happened to the party of Lincoln?

[RA1]

A nutjob is a nutjob from whatever idealogy. Certainly some teabaggers expouse the right wing conservative approach. If you have noticed, I don't particulary like any pols; they all are after their own agenda, which is not necessarily yours or mine.

Best regards,

RA1

[seattlebottom]

I still don't know why everyone is tip toeing around the issue that Republicans are largely responsible for creating an atmosphere where those who don't agree with them must be killed. The only thing that surprises me about this is that it was Giffords and not Pelosi or Reed who was attacked.

[demedici]

this is not about politics, at least i don't think so; did any of you read his youtube ppt posts? the guy was delusional. i think trying to ascribe to him any political ideology is misguided. he loved both hitler and lenin as well as grammar and gold-backed currencies.

a more productive conversation would be one where we talked about the state of mental health care in AZ or elsewhere. he was kicked out of school five times for scaring the crap out of his colleagues and teachers and no one thought that he might be a powder keg?

[Guest CharliePS]

this is not about politics, at least i don't think so; did any of you read his youtube ppt posts? the guy was delusional. i think trying to ascribe to him any political ideology is misguided. he loved both hitler and lenin as well as grammar and gold-backed currencies.

a more productive conversation would be one where we talked about the state of mental health care in AZ or elsewhere. he was kicked out of school five times for scaring the crap out of his colleagues and teachers and no one thought that he might be a powder keg?

People tend to be unaware that there are crazies in colleges until something like this happens. Having taught in a community college for many years, I encountered mentally deranged individuals many times, and came up against the difficulty of doing anything about them. Because of civil rights laws and the academic culture of nurturance, administrators are very reluctant to punish or remove such students, or to report them to anyone outside the school. The kinds of odd and inconsistent obsessions of this guy, such as his ungrammatical rants against people who don't learn proper grammar, are not that unusual.

[RA1]

Charlie PS-

Are you able to ascribe any political reasons for not being able to adequately cope with these "deranged" individuals? I am not trying to be right or left in this question, but merely political, if you can understand the difference.

What should have been done with them? I am not advocating one thing or another but SOMETHING should have been done, no? The right wing says mental defectives cannot be imprisoned because left wing advocates will not allow it. If this has any basis in truth or not, what should we do?

Thanks.

Best regards,

RA1

[TampaYankee]

What should have been done with them? I am not advocating one thing or another but SOMETHING should have been done, no? The right wing says mental defectives cannot be imprisoned because left wing advocates will not allow it. If this has any basis in truth or not, what should we do?

Not to be political here but... we do have a constitution. People do have rights, even the crazy. That is part of the problem. It shouldn't be easy to scoop people up and 'put them away' whether by family or authorities. On the other hand, there should be some avenue for providing hospital care for the critically mentally ill that can be instigated by family or authorities. Therein lies the rub. How do you draw lines in a very fuzzy environment balancing individual rights with individual and community safety.

The Left may stress the legitimate rights of the mentally ill. The Right is is reluctant or unwilling to fund the treatment facilities advocating dumping them in prisons which the Right is also equally unwilling to adequately fund and which is not an appropriate venue for mental patients.

The status quo is not working and hasn't been for decades. We just turn a blind eye to the problem until there is a flare up like this, or Virgina Tech, or Columbine. Clearly the track record is that we talk about seeking strategic solutions like mental health screening and treatment and gun restrictions for the menatlly suspect, but then forget about those solutions for lack of consensus or commitment and concentrate on tactical efforts of prevention through observation and techonolgy. Unfortunately, these are weak responses simply because it is only obvious after the fact as to who is the bad actor. Before the fact, he may have been one of a thousand in the Tucson area who shared similar red flags. Are we to 'put away' all thousand on speculation?

It is a tough problem, particularly if we cling to our absolute rights of due process and gun ownership. We need to see some gray area in limited circumstances for those rights, however consensus remains unlikely.

It is likely to be more beneficial to restore the comity in the country (and the schools for that matter) to reduce an inflammatory atmosphere that makes extreme langauge and attitudes more commonplace and thus seem less unacceptable, which could spill over into isolated actions, grave and not so grave alike.

That doesn't mean there wont be a Lee Harvey Oswald but maybe there will be fewer congressional or gov't office windows shot out or explosive envelopes sent to pols, or maybe one less congress person shot per decade. Who knows? Can more comity hurt? Are we as a country so intellectually ill equiped that we cannot make our political arguments without resorting to name calling or race baiting, or equating opponents with the most evil figures in history? Are our knuckles beginnging to drag in the dust once again?

[Guest CharliePS]

Charlie PS-

Are you able to ascribe any political reasons for not being able to adequately cope with these "deranged" individuals? I am not trying to be right or left in this question, but merely political, if you can understand the difference.

What should have been done with them? I am not advocating one thing or another but SOMETHING should have been done, no? The right wing says mental defectives cannot be imprisoned because left wing advocates will not allow it. If this has any basis in truth or not, what should we do?

Thanks.

Best regards,

RA1

The situation of dealing with disturbed students is complicated. On one side is the academic culture. Colleges traditionally were seen as serving in loco parentis, and academics tend to want to be good parents: the kind who love, accept and nurture even their difficult children. When students behave strangely or badly, they are usually referred to counselors, who serve as a buffer between faculty and administrators. Counselors see their function as healing, and try to avoid being perceived by the student as punishers. Unfortunately, students often do not accept the "parental" image of the school, but if they do, those who are unstable are likely to project their negative attitude toward their real family onto members of the academic "family." Finally, the counseling model is really designed to work with those who seek it voluntarily, not those who are forced into it, which is almost always the case with problem students.

Then there is the question of fear; first, the fear of malicious retaliation from an unstable student who has been provoked. Every year we see news reports of those incidents, from grammar to graduate school. Many administrators also have an almost paranoid fear of lawsuits. Violation of laws and regulations designed to protect student rights, from free speech to privacy, can be costly for the school; the expense of fighting cases, possibly paying large damages, or getting bad publicity (e.g., Notre Dame right now) frighten administrators who fear losing their own positions. The bizarre behavior in the classroom may not be observable in the courtroom, where a lawyer may represent the student, and the administrator looks like an oppressor. At my school, the deans went into panic mode whenever a professor thoughtlessly let an individual student's grade become known to any other student, for fear of a lawsuit about breach of confidentiality. Imagine what a lawyer can do with a leak about the student's mental health.

The result is that disturbed students get quietly passed on to other teachers and other schools, much like pedophile priests, whose behavior isn't revealed unless they finally do something that can't be hushed up. I had one student who heard voices, made bizarre comments in class, sometimes sang audibly to herself, and who became so enraged in another class that she tore the heavy classroom door off its hinges. She not only graduated, she came back a few years later to show off her subsequest university degree (I couldn't detect any change in her personality). After one course ended, I got a letter from one of the students, in which she said that, during the semester, she had sat in her car outside my home on several nights, with a loaded gun; then she thanked me for having given her a decent grade (which, by the way, she had earned). When I took the letter to the dean of students, he said that since I hadn't actually observed her doing this, and the letter contained no specific threat, there was nothing the school could or would do; end of discussion.

[RA1]

Thanks to both TY and CharliePS for answering.

TY-

I agree it is a difficult problem and with constitutional rights in place we cannot ever completely eliminate the "problem". I don't wish it to be otherwise. As the saying goes, I would rather release 100 guilty persons rather than execute one innocent one. However, that does not make it "easy" when things hit very close to home. If we "allow" mental defectives to roam about on their own, how can we limit and control legal gun owners, for instance? I am afraid we will always have "knuckle draggers" and, in certain instances, they can be very useful.

Charlie-

At first what you describe reminds me very much of how colleges and universities were 50 years ago. The gals were "protected", no frosh could have a car on campus, etc., etc. The education "authorities" were the "new" de facto parents, as you suggest. That method of doing things seems to be long gone now, much to my chagrin. Parents and their surrogates can be a very good thing.

From what you are reporting and/or suggesting, it seems to me that something akin to the "good samaritan" law would be good for learning institutions, whether upper or lower.

There certainly should be a "way" to deal with students such as the one you describe.

Thanks again.

Best regards,

RA1

[Guest CharliePS]

Thanks to both TY and CharliePS for answering.

TY-

I agree it is a difficult problem and with constitutional rights in place we cannot ever completely eliminate the "problem". I don't wish it to be otherwise. As the saying goes, I would rather release 100 guilty persons rather than execute one innocent one. However, that does not make it "easy" when things hit very close to home. If we "allow" mental defectives to roam about on their own, how can we limit and control legal gun owners, for instance? I am afraid we will always have "knuckle draggers" and, in certain instances, they can be very useful.

Charlie-

At first what you describe reminds me very much of how colleges and universities were 50 years ago. The gals were "protected", no frosh could have a car on campus, etc., etc. The education "authorities" were the "new" de facto parents, as you suggest. That method of doing things seems to be long gone now, much to my chagrin. Parents and their surrogates can be a very good thing.

From what you are reporting and/or suggesting, it seems to me that something akin to the "good samaritan" law would be good for learning institutions, whether upper or lower.

There certainly should be a "way" to deal with students such as the one you describe.

Thanks again.

Best regards,

RA1

Every instructor and classmate who observed the behavior of the first student I described said, "Something should be done about her!" However, no one could figure out what the something could be. Non-threatening bizarre behavior is not illegal, nor is it a clear indication of future violence. Ripping the door off its hinges could have been prosecuted as a property crime, but instead she was allowed to apologize and remain as a student if she participated in counseling, which she did, and there were no more similar incidents. (I suspect the fact that her pastor was influential in the city may have affected that decision.) But her inappropriate comments continued. I saved the letter from the student with the gun, in case anything happened in the future, but I never saw her again. One hulking ex-con, who wore brass knuckles to class and sat in the front row glowering at the instructor, was reported to his parole agent, who removed him from the school, but that sort of outside help was unusual.

[Guest Conway]

It was just a matter of time before all of these incendiary comments was going to move someone to attempt assasination. Adding guns to the mix by people parading around public event 'packing' just pour gasoline on the hyped up raw feelings.

There are many figures, public and private, with dirty hands in the era of second ammendment solutions from Tea Party individuals to talking heads and print pundits to State Governors and members of Congress.

Finally, the sherif of that Tuscon county spoke out calling a spade a spade and decried his own state being the capitol of the craziness rooted in fear hate and bigotry. Watch the usual hate mongering talking heads back away from any responsibility, intended or not, for this atmosphere. They'll blame it on a lone psycho and ignore their infammatory part in moving these nuts to action. That is the way instagtors work, from the sidelines.

Well, if we're going to blame this episode on incendiary right of center talk radio, then let's address the root cause of the vitriol that the left has so fervently embraced the elimination of since Saturday afternoon.

Our representative government is broken and people are mad as hell that their representatives in Congress don't give a damn what they think or what they want. Elected officials are perceived to be engaged to a party platform rather than to the electorate which gives them the job that they so embrace.

Representative Giffords lived in a district where there was overwhelming opposition to Obamacare and overwhelming support of strong control of our border with Mexico. Yet, Representative Giffords aligned herself with her parties leadership and voted against the wishes of her constituents on legislation relating to those two issues that are important to Arizonans as well as others.

Her constituency, which is 99.99% well balanced and normal, processed its anger with her like rational people do. They voted for her opponent in the last election, they wrote letters to the editor, they donated to political causes that supported their beliefs.

One crazed nutjob, who had a political agenda far more left-radical than that of representative Giffords, took matters into his own hands and committed a cowardly and radical act of desperation.

Within hours of the shooting, the national media, had immersed itself in full scale jerking of both knees, blaming the attack on the vitriol of conservative radio and television hosts despite the fact that it knew nothing of the political positions of psychological fragility of Rep. Giffords' attacker. Some, went so far as to suggest that the free speech rights of those with whom they disagreed should be censored in the spirit of reigning in "hate speech" (their moniker for "anything that we disagree with").

Yet, subsequent to the publishing of the article that identified the shooter as a "left wing radical pothead", you didn't hear the press calling for the burning of Mother Jones, the closure of Huffington, or the cancellation of advertising as it relates to that screaming idiot of "The ED Show" on MSNBC.

To me, this story is more about the knee jerk finger pointing of the establishment media than it is about the act that Jared Loughlin had committed.

The American left and its lapdog mainstream media were willing to throw the first amendment out of fashion by dinner time Saturday night as a result of this highly isolated incident.

People who think like these national press types who seem to know what is better for me than I do, and who would purport to curb the free speech of those of a different political persuasion than themselves really scare me much more than some lone crazy with a gun and a couple of automatic clips does.

You folks on the left should be ashamed for even suggesting such a thing.

[Guest CharliePS]

Well, if we're going to blame this episode on incendiary right of center talk radio, then let's address the root cause of the vitriol that the left has so fervently embraced the elimination of since Saturday afternoon.

Our representative government is broken and people are mad as hell that their representatives in Congress don't give a damn what they think or what they want. Elected officials are perceived to be engaged to a party platform rather than to the electorate which gives them the job that they so embrace.

Representative Giffords lived in a district where there was overwhelming opposition to Obamacare and overwhelming support of strong control of our border with Mexico. Yet, Representative Giffords aligned herself with her parties leadership and voted against the wishes of her constituents on legislation relating to those two issues that are important to Arizonans as well as others.

Her constituency, which is 99.99% well balanced and normal, processed its anger with her like rational people do. They voted for her opponent in the last election, they wrote letters to the editor, they donated to political causes that supported their beliefs.

One crazed nutjob, who had a political agenda far more left-radical than that of representative Giffords, took matters into his own hands and committed a cowardly and radical act of desperation.

Within hours of the shooting, the national media, had immersed itself in full scale jerking of both knees, blaming the attack on the vitriol of conservative radio and television hosts despite the fact that it knew nothing of the political positions of psychological fragility of Rep. Giffords' attacker. Some, went so far as to suggest that the free speech rights of those with whom they disagreed should be censored in the spirit of reigning in "hate speech" (their moniker for "anything that we disagree with").

Yet, subsequent to the publishing of the article that identified the shooter as a "left wing radical pothead", you didn't hear the press calling for the burning of Mother Jones, the closure of Huffington, or the cancellation of advertising as it relates to that screaming idiot of "The ED Show" on MSNBC.

To me, this story is more about the knee jerk finger pointing of the establishment media than it is about the act that Jared Loughlin had committed.

The American left and its lapdog mainstream media were willing to throw the first amendment out of fashion by dinner time Saturday night as a result of this highly isolated incident.

People who think like these national press types who seem to know what is better for me than I do, and who would purport to curb the free speech of those of a different political persuasion than themselves really scare me much more than some lone crazy with a gun and a couple of automatic clips does.

You folks on the left should be ashamed for even suggesting such a thing.

Although I agree with your point that the media jumped the gun in blaming conservative/right wing/tea party rhetoric for motivating an obviously mentally disturbed man--we don't yet know what caused him to commit this crazy act--I think there are a couple of flaws in your own analysis. To turn around and characterize him as a "left radical" is to make the same sort of unsupported generalization. There is no apparent consistency to his own political beliefs/obsessions, unless you think that leftists believe that the federal government is trying to control us through grammar (what the hell does that even mean?!). If there was such "overwhelming opposition" among her constituents to Gifford's votes on Obamacare and immigration, why did they re-elect her instead of the candidate who ran on those issues? Perhaps the notion of overwhelming opposition to her positions on those issues is also an exaggeration.

[Guest Conway]

Although I agree with your point that the media jumped the gun in blaming conservative/right wing/tea party rhetoric for motivating an obviously mentally disturbed man--we don't yet know what caused him to commit this crazy act--I think there are a couple of flaws in your own analysis. To turn around and characterize him as a "left radical" is to make the same sort of unsupported generalization. There is no apparent consistency to his own political beliefs/obsessions, unless you think that leftists believe that the federal government is trying to control us through grammar (what the hell does that even mean?!). If there was such "overwhelming opposition" among her constituents to Gifford's votes on Obamacare and immigration, why did they re-elect her instead of the candidate who ran on those issues? Perhaps the notion of overwhelming opposition to her positions on those issues is also an exaggeration.

There have been many news articles supporting both points in the press over the last few days. A close friend and band mate of Loughner's from high school labeled him as a "left wing pot smoker" who was very dissatisfied with the politics of Congresswoman Giffords. Loughner described her to this person as being both too conservative and dumb. I just read the news. I don't write it.

To correct your argument, I described the shooter as more left radical than his victim, which that eyewitness report seems to support. Not simply as "left radical" as you infer. Your framing of words from my argument is exactly the kind of behavior that those who wish to curb the first amendment liberties of others use to support those types of agendas.

As for the opposition to Obamacare and favor for tightening border security in her district, I can only encourage you to google polling on the subjects that substantiate my position.

This is nothing more than an effort by the American political left to attempt to curb the first amendment rights of others in the name of "civility".

[Guest CharliePS]

There have been many news articles supporting both points in the press over the last few days. A close friend and band mate of Loughner's from high school labeled him as a "left wing pot smoker" who was very dissatisfied with the politics of Congresswoman Giffords. Loughner described her to this person as being both too conservative and dumb. I just read the news. I don't write it.

To correct your argument, I described the shooter as more left radical than his victim, which that eyewitness report seems to support. Not simply as "left radical" as you infer. Your framing of words from my argument is exactly the kind of behavior that those who wish to curb the first amendment liberties of others use to support those types of agendas.

As for the opposition to Obamacare and favor for tightening border security in her district, I can only encourage you to google polling on the subjects that substantiate my position.

This is nothing more than an effort by the American political left to attempt to curb the first amendment rights of others in the name of "civility".

I see. So, "far more left radical" than his victim doesn't characterize him as "left radical"? Hmmm. And your support for the claim that he leans "left radical" is that one of his classmates described him as "left wing"? You seem to have pretty easy standards for your definitions. And you still don't address the issue of why her constituents voted for her despite her votes on Obamacare and immigration. Maybe those issues aren't as important to most of them as you presume.

[KYTOP]

Well, if we're going to blame this episode on incendiary right of center talk radio, then let's address the root cause of the vitriol that the left has so fervently embraced the elimination of since Saturday afternoon.

Our representative government is broken and people are mad as hell that their representatives in Congress don't give a damn what they think or what they want. Elected officials are perceived to be engaged to a party platform rather than to the electorate which gives them the job that they so embrace.

Representative Giffords lived in a district where there was overwhelming opposition to Obamacare and overwhelming support of strong control of our border with Mexico. Yet, Representative Giffords aligned herself with her parties leadership and voted against the wishes of her constituents on legislation relating to those two issues that are important to Arizonans as well as others.

Her constituency, which is 99.99% well balanced and normal, processed its anger with her like rational people do. They voted for her opponent in the last election, they wrote letters to the editor, they donated to political causes that supported their beliefs.

One crazed nutjob, who had a political agenda far more left-radical than that of representative Giffords, took matters into his own hands and committed a cowardly and radical act of desperation.

Within hours of the shooting, the national media, had immersed itself in full scale jerking of both knees, blaming the attack on the vitriol of conservative radio and television hosts despite the fact that it knew nothing of the political positions of psychological fragility of Rep. Giffords' attacker. Some, went so far as to suggest that the free speech rights of those with whom they disagreed should be censored in the spirit of reigning in "hate speech" (their moniker for "anything that we disagree with").

Yet, subsequent to the publishing of the article that identified the shooter as a "left wing radical pothead", you didn't hear the press calling for the burning of Mother Jones, the closure of Huffington, or the cancellation of advertising as it relates to that screaming idiot of "The ED Show" on MSNBC.

To me, this story is more about the knee jerk finger pointing of the establishment media than it is about the act that Jared Loughlin had committed.

The American left and its lapdog mainstream media were willing to throw the first amendment out of fashion by dinner time Saturday night as a result of this highly isolated incident.

People who think like these national press types who seem to know what is better for me than I do, and who would purport to curb the free speech of those of a different political persuasion than themselves really scare me much more than some lone crazy with a gun and a couple of automatic clips does.

You folks on the left should be ashamed for even suggesting such a thing.

Well said and you make alot of good points.

With that said I think it is too bad so many are trying to make political points from this tragedy. We should all grieve for those killed, their families and keep those wounded in our thoughts. Hopefully the courts will determine the outcome of the rest.

[Guest Conway]

Well said and you make alot of good points.

With that said I think it is too bad so many are trying to make political points from this tragedy. We should all grieve for those killed, their families and keep those wounded in our thoughts. Hopefully the courts will determine the outcome of the rest.

That's a great point. Unfortunately, the talking heads had turned it into a divisive political issue before the blood could even be washed from the parking lot.

The Arizona Republic called the Pima County Sheriff to task in an editorial today for using the tragic event to promote a political agenda based on a foundation that included a lot of non-factual information.

[Guest Conway]

I see. So, "far more left radical" than his victim doesn't characterize him as "left radical"? Hmmm. And your support for the claim that he leans "left radical" is that one of his classmates described him as "left wing"? You seem to have pretty easy standards for your definitions. And you still don't address the issue of why her constituents voted for her despite her votes on Obamacare and immigration. Maybe those issues aren't as important to most of them as you presume.

She won a very close and very divisive election due to her extreme positions.

[Guest CharliePS]

She won a very close and very divisive election due to her extreme positions.

Loughner's fixation on alleged government conspiracies to control the citizens is a regular concern of the far right, not the left. His ideas about currency come from the right wing opponents of the Federal Reserve, his idea that we are being a controlled by a "second Constitution" made up of post-Civil War amendments is promoted by white supremacists, and the grammar conspiracy idea comes from a right wing nutcase named David Wynn Miller. The fact that he also likes the Communist Manifesto, marijuana and punk rock isn't enough to make him left or right of anyone. What it makes him is a very confused young man. Giffords seems to be considered relatively centrist, rather than extremist, by her colleagues in both parties.

[Lucky]

Loughner's fixation on alleged government conspiracies to control the citizens is a regular concern of the far right, not the left. His ideas about currency come from the right wing opponents of the Federal Reserve, his idea that we are being a controlled by a "second Constitution" made up of post-Civil War amendments is promoted by white supremacists, and the grammar conspiracy idea comes from a right wing nutcase named David Wynn Miller. The fact that he also likes the Communist Manifesto, marijuana and punk rock isn't enough to make him left or right of anyone. What it makes him is a very confused young man. Giffords seems to be considered relatively centrist, rather than extremist, by her colleagues in both parties.

It always amazes me when the right wingers spin things to avoid responsibility. They have been egging people on to shoot someone for some time now, but don't want to take the responsibility when it happens.

Put 'em in the crosshairs apparently means whatever the Repubs want it to mean until it actually takesw on its real meaning.