Dems And GOP Agree: Gun Control Is A Non-Starter In AZ Following Shooting

Lets Have A Rational Conversation About Guns
In the wake of the Tucson carnage, there has been considerable discussion here and elsewhere about Gun Possession and carry laws. Some have speculated that private Gun Possession would have reduced the death and injury toll in Tucson. Others have speculated that the toll would have increased with the presence of additional guns. What both sides have in common is that they are speculating. As a backdrop for this discussion, let’s begin with a thumbnail look at the current state of gun law and ...

Gun Laws Around The World (PHOTOS): How Weapon Ownership Restrictions Vary
Democractic Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords remains in critical condition after Saturday's grisly shootings in Arizona, which left six people dead. Though friends, family and supporters remain hopeful for Giffords' recovery, the attack has reportedly launched yet another debate on national Gun Control among U.S. lawmakers. Whether or not stricter laws could've somehow curbed alleged gunman Jared Lee Loughner's access to Firearms may unfortunately never be known. But just how does Legislation...

Americans Split on Stricter Gun Control Laws, Continuing a Longtime Trend
Most Americans don't believe that stricter Gun Control laws would have prevented the shootings in Arizona on Saturday and the public is split on the question of toughening the laws regulating who can own Firearms, according to a CBS News poll conducted Dec. 17-20. (Story; Poll Data) The lack of a public mandate for stricter laws reflects the same finding of a Gallup analysis released Tuesday, which shows that support for stricter Gun Laws has declined over the last two decades even though that p...

Fitting Memorial For Arizona Shooting Victims
President Obama, will speak at tonight’s public memorial service for the Victims of last weekend’s shootings in Arizona. The service and Speech will be carried live on Cable News networks, online, and elsewhere, beginning at 8PM EST. As he grieves with and consoles thousands in person at the University of Arizona’s McKale Center in Tuscon, the president will also be reaching out to the entire nation, helping with the healing process, and framing this terrible tragedy as the tea...

Gun-law arguments heat up after Arizona shooting
TUCSON, Ariz. | Jared Lee Loughner had trouble with the law, was rejected by The Army because of a history of drug use and was considered so mentally unstable that he was banned from his college campus, where officials considered him a threat to other Students and faculty. But the 22-year-old had no trouble buying the Glock semiautomatic pistol that authorities say he used in the Tucson rampage Saturday that left six dead and 14 injured, including Democratic Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Mr. Loughner...

Loughner Stopped by Police Hours before Shooting
With all the evidence against the suspected Tucson shooter Jared Loughner, a Guilty verdict could still prove very difficult. Jan Crawford reports on the latest details of the case. Though Jared Lee Loughner's parents were "completely surprised" by the news of the Tucson shooting, former friends and classmates of Loughner's were not. Ben Tracy reports on the troubled past of Jared Lee Loughner. Doctors at Tucson's University Medical Center are increasingly optimistic about Ariz. Democratic Rep. ...

Boehner rejects new gun regulation
Image by Getty Images via @daylife The Hill: Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) is rejecting gun-control Legislation offered by the chairman of the Homeland Security Committee in response to the weekend shootings of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) and 19 others in Arizona. Rep. Pete King (R-N.Y.) announced plans Tuesday to introduce Legislation prohibiting people from carrying guns within 1,000 feet of members of Congress. ...How are you going to enforce a moving 1,000 feet exclusion zone again...

Why there's no more debate on gun control
FORTUNE -- The tragic shooting on Saturday of Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D) and 19 others has renewed a national conversation about whether our Gun Laws need tightening. But the chatter for the most part has so far ignored a curious fact: in Congress, the arena where any new restrictions would be decided, the debate effectively ended years ago. Even over the last two years, when Democrats controlled both the White House and Congress, Gun Rights advocates led by the National Rifle Associati...

Will Tucson Tragedy Shift Gun Control Debate?
Roanoke Firearms store owner John Markell holds a Glock 19 Handgun, the model used in both the 2007 Virginia Tech massacre and the recent shootings in Tucson, Ariz. Sales of the handgun surged after both events. In the wake of the tragic shooting in Tucson Saturday, pundits have spent countless hours debating the role of Sarah Palin in the story - despite the fact that there is no evidence that alleged shooter Jared Lee Loughner is a Palin supporter or had ever seen or heard her Rhetoric. What ...

Louisville lawmaker working to ban guns from state Capitol
Louisville, Ky. (WHAS11)- The Arizona shootings have sparked a debate over Gun Control in the country and if guns should be allowed in State Capitols. Currently in Kentucky, guns are permitted, but two lawmakers in Louisville want that to change. State Representative Darryl Owens called last Saturday's shooting, killing six people and injured others including Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, frightening, tragic and unnecessary. It is also why he has contacted House Speaker Greg Stumbo, to ban...

Louisville lawmaker working to ban guns from state Capitol
Louisville, Ky. (WHAS11)- The Arizona shootings have sparked a debate over Gun Control in the country and if guns should be allowed in State Capitols. Currently in Kentucky, guns are permitted, but two lawmakers in Louisville want that to change. State Representative Darryl Owens called last Saturday's shooting, killing six people and injured others including Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, frightening, tragic and unnecessary. It is also why he has contacted House Speaker Greg Stumbo, to ban...

Rep. Brodeur files Doc, dont ask gun bill
TALLAHASSEE — Doctors and other medical providers would be barred from asking patients - or the parents of child patients - if they have guns in their home under a measure that promises a major showdown between powerful lobbying groups. The National Rifle Association’s top Florida Lobbyist and a Florida Medical Association member both say the issue is among the top priorities for the session, with the groups holding diametrically opposed positions on what doctors and thei...

Gun Controls Golden Opportunity
As a result of Saturday’s tragedy in Tucson there have been renewed calls for tighter Gun Control laws across the nation. Arizona is one of the most gun-friendly states in the union, causing some on the left to conclude that if the Grand Canyon State had tighter controls on Gun Ownership, six lives would have been saved and Representative Gabrielle Giffords wouldn’t be lying in a Hospital bed. There’s more here than just the usual sort of Monday morning quarterbacking that occu...

Rep. Peter King would surround himself with 72-acre Constitution-free zone
As Los Angeles Gun Rights Examiner John Longenecker has already discussed, Congressman Peter King (R-NY) has come up with a . . . novel approach to protecting, well . . . . himself, from the kind of sick, deranged lunatic who shot Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and so many others in Tucson Saturday.  According to Politico, he wants to forbid Firearms carried by Private Citizens within 1,000 feet of himself and other "important figures" (who would include Congressmen Russ Carnahan and Will...

Gun Sales Surge In Arizona After Shooting
Saturday’s horrific shooting in Tucson has predictably prompted criticism of the lax Gun Laws that allowed a guy with documented mental problems to buy a semiautomatic weapon. So, naturally the state’s gun lovers are frantically arming themselves to the teeth, in case stricter Gun Control (like not letting the mentally ill own assault weapons) is imposed. Bloomberg reporter Michael Riley talked to an Arizona gun store owner who reported that gun sales surged after Saturday’s sh...

Glock Pistol Sales Surge in Aftermath of Arizona Shootings
Greg Wolff, the owner of two Arizona gun shops, told his manager to get ready for a stampede of new customers after a Glock-wielding gunman killed six people at a Tucson shopping center on Jan. 8. Wolff was right. Instead of hurting sales, the massacre had the $499 semi-automatic pistols -- popular with police, sport shooters and gangsters -- flying out the doors of his Glockmeister stores in Mesa and Phoenix. You must login to comment. The Fox Nation is for those opposed to intolerance, excessi...

Did Democrats Give Up in Gun Control Debate?
As The Times’ Dalia Sussman noted yesterday, Americans have generally become more protective of Gun Ownership rights in recent years. There are some exception to the rule — for instance, according to the General Social Survey, which has been conducted intermittently since 1972, the percentage of Americans who think that permits should be required before a gun can be obtained has gradually risen (from 72 percent in 1972 to 79 percent in 2008). Background Checks for gun owners are over...

Sen. Barbara Boxer In Her Own Words
At a Press Conference in Southern California Tuesday, Sen. Barbara Boxer talked about the Mass Shooting in Arizona that left six people dead and 14 others injured included Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Sen. Boxer's remarks in her own words: Like many Americans, I have been deeply affected by political Assassinations in my lifetime – John Kennedy, Robert Kennedy, Martin Luther King, Jr. – three figures who inspired me. And it took years and years and years – maybe 15 or 20 years &nda...;

Democrats denounced the rhetoric, Republicans denounced the violence
My weekly column in the Charleston Daily Mail: Saturday’s snow in Poca was a reminder of why I like December snow but hate snow in January and February. The novelty has worn off. That afternoon, I drove into the cold to fill the tank of my wife’s car. Coming back, I could not make it up the hill, so I parked the car and walked home. “You know all those dumb things I have done over the years?” I asked my wife when I made it home. “Well, you can add this to the list...

President Obama has a chance to be Clintonian tonight if he doesnt waste it
I recently wrote about the shameless attempts by some on the left to politicize the tragedy in Arizona.   New York Times columnist Paul Krugman and Pima County Sherriff Clarence Dupnik were among the voices rushing to blame Right Wing talk, Cable News and a “climate of hate” for the Arizona shooting that claimed six lives, including a 9 year old girl and Republican Federal Judge, and injured Democrat Representative Gabrielle Giffords.  That they were doing so within ho...

Arizona shooting: Sarah Palin breaks silence, blames media, offers no apology
 Wednesday morning Sarah Palin broke her silence concerning the role her violent Rhetoric may have played in creating a climate of political violence leading up to the tragic shooting in Arizona. An angry and defensive Palin offered no Apology for her violent campaign Rhetoric and imagery, instead Palin blamed the media for Manufacturing a "blood Libel." Palin's message came in the form of a slick, well rehearsed, over produced video that was ultimately c...

McDonnell's security tightened following Arizona shooting
Officials have tightened security for Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell following the Mass Shootings in Tucson. Reporters covering a McDonnell news conference this week were told they would no longer be able to approach the Governor after he had started speaking to place recorders or microphones on his lectern. McDonnell, however, told reporters that the shooting that killed six people and severely injured a congresswoman had not changed his security. When told of the changes, McDonnell said "I had n...

A Scramble To Control Narrative Of Tucson Massacre
Gun rights advocates and right-wing radio talkers have accused their critics of exploiting the massacre in Tucson, Ariz., for political gain. Firearms control Activists have responded to the Saturday shooting by decrying the right's increasingly mainstream theme of "Second Amendment" solutions to "government tyranny" and Sarah Palin's online 2010 campaign map, which featured gun-sight cross hairs over targeted districts. Mental Health experts, cautioning against stigmatizing those with treatable...

No One Can Anticipate Anything
Rachel Maddow states the depressingly obvious about the shooting in Arizona: It is hard for anybody to find the words to express the horror and the anger and the grief that are the only rational responses to massacres like this.  But the one thing that events like this are not, in America, now, is inconceivable or unimaginable. Meaning, of course, that “inconceivable,” “unimaginable” tragedies actually happen all the time, because we can’t - or won’t...

Wonkbook: NCLB reform coming; Boehner opposes new gun laws; John Kerry's speech; oil spill recommendations
Obama wants to revise No Child Left Behind, reports Nick Anderson: "President Obama will mount a fresh attempt this year to rewrite the No Child Left Behind education law, a top administration official said this week, and key congressional Republicans said they are ready to deal... Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.), chairman of a subcommittee on elementary and secondary education, said there is Bipartisan consensus that the 2002 law should be overhauled...[but] some Republicans say a big bill could ...