U.S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords, Democrat:
“We know that silence equals consent when atrocities are committed against innocent men, women, and children. We know that indifference equals complicity when bigotry, hatred and intolerance are allowed to take root. And we know that education and hope are the most effective ways to combat ignorance and despair.”
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Remember The Shooting
Of Gabrielle Giffords
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Tucson, Arizona, Jan. 8, 2011
(Wikipedia)
On January 8, 2011, a mass shooting occurred near Tucson, Arizona. Nineteen people were shot, six of them fatally, with one other person injured at the scene. The shooting occurred during an open meeting that U.S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords was holding with members of her constituency in a Safeway parking lot. Those killed in the incident include United States District Court for the District of Arizona Chief Judge John Roll, one of Rep. Giffords’s staffers, and a little girl. News reports identified the target of the attack as Giffords, a Democrat representing Arizona’s 8th congressional district. She was shot through the head at point-blank rang. Her medical condition was initially described as “critical”. She survived ~ barely.
A 22-year-old Tucson man, Jared Lee Loughner, was arrested at the scene. Federal prosecutors have filed five charges against him, including the attempted assassination of a member of Congress, and the assassination of a federal judge. Both of those charges carry the possibility of the death penalty. On May 25, 2011, Loughner was found by a judge to be incompetent to stand trial based on two medical evaluations. He’s still incarcerated and, as of this writing, involuntarily sedated.
Rawclyde adds:
Some people, mostly Republicans, dismiss the massacre as the mere act of a deranged individual. But when Michele Bachmann (R-Minn.) asks her supporters to get “armed and dangerous,” and another campaigning Republican suggests “Second Amendment remedies,” and Giffords’ rival even holds an event offering his supporters a chance to shoot an M16 at pictures of the congresswoman, and then Giffords and 18 others are shot down, six fatally, well, I beg to defer. If you’re running for office or a member of the media and talking like a goon, you’re encouraging the United States of America to become Goon Nation instead of the democracy that more savvy people will it to be…
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! Vote 2012 !
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photo
Gabrielle Giffords
art
Rudolph Carl Gorman's Taos Storytellers