Gabrielle Giffords' Arizona shooting prompts resignations

Several AZ Republicans Resign Amid Fears of Tea Party Violence
What the Arizona Republic calls a “nasty little battle” has broken out among Republican members of Arizona’s Legislative District 20 in the wake of the Gabrielle Giffords shooting. Several Republicans have resigned, citing fears that local Tea Party supporters will harm them or their families for not being conservative enough. Now-former Chairman Anthony Miller was among those to resign. A former campaign worker for Sen. John McCain, Miller sent an email to state Repu...

Arizona GOP Official Resigns, Citing Tea Party Threats: 'I Don't Want to Take a Bullet'
Several GOP officials from the same area in Arizona have resigned following last week's shooting rampage in Tucson, including a district chairman who said threats from local Tea Party members caused him to be worried for the safety of himself and his family. Anthony Miller, 43, stepped down earlier this week as chairman of Republican District 20 after his wife expressed concerns about "constant verbal attacks" against him since helping Sen. John McCain narrowly win Reelection in November, The A...

Arizona is for Gunloons
There are about 14 or 15 black GOPers in the known universe. Usually, a black GOPer is treated with deep reverence by Repugs in order to hold him up as an example of GOP "diversity." Except in Arizona: In an e-mail sent a few hours after Saturday's massacre in Tucson that killed six and injured 13, including U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, Miller told state Republican Party Chairman Randy Pullen he was quitting: "Today my wife of 20 yrs ask (sic) me do I think that my PCs (Precinct Committee mem...

Asking The Right Questions
Do you agree that the "eliminationist Rhetoric" cited by Krugman is a problem and is out of bounds? Are you denying that such rhetoric exists, or that the preponderance of it comes from the right? More broadly, putting aside the case of Jared Loughner, is it a valid question to ask whether such rhetoric in general risks tipping the unhinged into violence? An Arizona Republican Party District Chairman resigned shortly after the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) and 18 others on Saturday...

Obama leads mourning of Arizona shooting victims
By Jeff Mason and Tim Gaynor TUCSON, Arizona | Wed Jan 12, 2011 9:10pm EST TUCSON, Arizona (Reuters) - President Barack Obama mourned the Victims of an Arizona Shooting Spree on Wednesday and urged Americans not to let the debate over the tragedy be used as "one more occasion to turn on one another." In an emotional address to thousands of people who packed a Tucson arena for a memorial service, Obama said no one knew what prompted a gunman to go on a rampage that killed six people and critic...

Obama leads mourning of Arizona shooting victims
TUCSON, Arizona (Reuters) - President Barack Obama mourned the Victims of an Arizona shooting spree on Wednesday and urged Americans not to let the debate over the tragedy be used as "one more occasion to turn on one another." In an emotional address to thousands of people who packed a Tucson arena for a memorial service, Obama said no one knew what prompted a gunman to go on a rampage that killed six people and critically wounded Representative Gabrielle Giffords. He warned against seeking "sim...

President Obama Tells the Nation Gabrielle Giffords Opened Her Eyes Today Shortly After He Visited Her Video 1/12/11
Here is video of President Obama tonight telling the nation that Democrat Rep. Gabrielle Giffords opened her eyes today for the first time shortly after he visited her in Tucson, Arizona. Obama shared the good news during his Speech tonight at a Memorial Service on the campus of the University of Arizona. Via Gateway Pundit ...

Obama leads memorial service for Arizona shooting victims
President Barack Obama flew to Arizona and headed straight to Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' bedside to pay his respects to the wounded lawmaker as he sought to unify a mourning nation....

Ariz. GOP official resigns: Won't 'take a bullet'
A local Arizona Republican Party official resigned from his post after Rep. Gabrielle Giffords was shot out of concern for his and his family's safety. Anthony Miller, a GOP district chairman and former campaign aide to Sen. John McCain, told The Arizona Republic: I don't want to take a bullet for anyone." Miller, the first African American to hold the post, was recently re-elected to a one-year term as chairman of the Legislative District 20 Republicans. He told the newspaper that verbal abuse ...

The desperation of the left
Image by Getty Images via @daylife Daniel Henninger: ... They expected to take losses in November. What they got instead was Armageddon. Suddenly an authentic reform movement, linked to the Republican Party, whose goal simply is to stop the public spending curve, had come to life. This poses a mortal threat to the financial oxygen in the economic ecosystem that the public wing of the Democratic Party has inhabited all these years. The stakes for the American left in 2012 couldn't possibly be h...

Arizona Republicans fearing Tea Party violence resign
 Fearing Tea Party violence, four Arizona Republican officials have resigned their positions. Arizona Legislative District 20 Republican Chairman Anthony Miller and District 20 Republican Secretary Sophia Johnson, as well as first vice chairman Roger Dickinson, and former district spokesman Jeff Kolb have all resigned their positions. The Resignations come in the aftermath of Saturday's tragic shooting in Tucson, Arizona. Six were killed and Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ar...

Arizona Republican party officials resign after Tucson shooting
While federal lawmakers debate how best to increase safety for themselves and their staff, some Arizona Republican party officials are choosing to leave office in the face of threats. A conflict that has been going on between local Arizona Republicans came to an end in the wake of the shooting in Tucson on Saturday when Arizona's Republican District 20 Chairman Anthony Miller and several others chose to resign. The Arizona Republic reports that Miller, 43, a former campaign worker for Sen.John ...

Obama Comforts Nation After Tucson Tragedy
More than 12,000 people at the University of Arizona's McKale Memorial Center and millions more across the country will hear President Obama talk about Saturday's shooting in Tucson, Ariz., that killed six and wounded 14, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. More Video ...

Republican quits party leadership post because of Tea Party threats
After years of hearing how liberals were a bunch of pansies too weak to deal with America's enemies yadda yadda yadda, Conservatives are now trying to convince everyone that we're blood-thirsty violence mongers. Yet it ain't hippy liberals this Arizona Republican is afraid of. A nasty battle between factions of Legislative District 20 Republicans and fears that it could turn violent in the wake of what happened in Tucson on Saturday prompted District Chairman Anthony Miller and several others t...

SIGN OF THE TIMES
SIGN OF THE TIMES Do lawmakers need Bodyguards now? Almost half of Americans agree with the idea - 48 percent of the respondents say lawmakers "should be given Bodyguards to help protect them," says a new CBS News poll. Forty-two percent disagreed. The public is split about danger. A slim plurality - 47 percent - says the Arizona shootings were a random event and not likely to be repeated; 45 percent predicted there would be more incidents. The specter of violence already has taken an extra toll...

Pelosi was in room when Giffords opened her eyes
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand and Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz, all close friends of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, were in the Hospital room with the Arizona Democrat when she opened her eyes for the first time since she was shot in the head Saturday during a rampage that killed six in Tucson, Ariz. In a Speech at a University of Arizona service for the Victims of the shootings, President Barack Obama broke the news that Giffords, who has been in critical condition si...

6 killed in Tucson remembered at memorial
TUCSON, Jan. 12 (UPI) -- Six people killed at a political event in Tucson were memorialized at a rally Wednesday, one day after a memorial mass in their honor at a Tucson church. Christina Green and those who died with her were remembered Tuesday in a mass at the church where the 9-year-old had her first communion. Bishop Gerald Kicanas gave the homily at St. Odilia Roman Catholic Church, the Arizona Star reported. The aftermath of the Rep. Giffords shooting The service was called a Mass for th...

Obama urges nation to speak healing words in Ariz.
TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) — Summoning the soul of a nation, President Barack Obama on Wednesday implored Americans to honor those slain and injured in the Arizona shootings by becoming better people, telling a polarized citizenry that it is time to talk with each other “in a way that heals, not in a way wounds.” Following a Hospital bedside visit with Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, the target of the Assassination, he said: “She knows we’re here, and she knows we love her.”...

Obama: Giffords opened eyes for first time
President Barack Obama says that Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords has opened her eyes for the first time since being shot through the head on Saturday. The president says it happened a few minutes after he left her Hospital room Wednesday evening. The president, speaking at a prayer service in Tucson for Shooting Victims, says that Giffords' husband allowed him to share the news with the crowd. That brought people to their feet amid cheering. The president says that after he left Giffords' hospi...

Politicians packing heat
Image via Wikipedia Washington Post: When he's traveling to meet constituents, bumping along the back roads of central Utah in his Ford F-150 truck, it's not unusual for Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R) to have a Handgun strapped to his hip. A longtime gun owner, Chaffetz said that in light of the attempt last weekend on the life of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.), he thinks it might be a good idea to bring his Glock 23 even more often when he heads out into the country. "It's just that you never kno...

Obama: Polarized Nation Needs Healing
TUCSON, Ariz. - Summoning the soul of a nation, President Barack Obama on Wednesday implored Americans to honor those slain and injured in the Arizona shootings by becoming better people, telling a polarized citizenry that it is time to talk with each other "in a way that heals, not in a way wounds." Following a Hospital bedside visit with Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, the target of the Assassination, he said: "She knows we're here, and she knows we love her." In a memorably dramatic moment, the pres...

[Headline] - PRESIDENT COOL SAYS CHILL
TUCSON, Ariz. – Summoning the soul of a nation, President Barack Obama on Wednesday implored Americans to honor those slain and injured in the Arizona shootings by becoming better people, telling a polarized citizenry that it is time to talk with each other "in a way that heals, not in a way wounds." Following a Hospital bedside visit with Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, the target of the Assassination, he said: "She knows we're here, and she knows we love her." In a memorably dramatic moment, th...

Obama goes for unity in Tucson memorial speech
TUCSON, Ariz. (AP) — Summoning the soul of a nation, President Barack Obama on Wednesday implored Americans to honor those slain and injured in the Arizona shootings by becoming better people, telling a polarized citizenry that it is time to talk with each other "in a way that heals, not in a way wounds." Following a Hospital bedside visit with Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, the target of the Assassination, he said: "She knows we're here, and she knows we love her." In a memorably dramatic momen...

Obama Visits Rep. Gabrielle Giffords at the Hospital
via Mark Knoller Obama welcomed on arrival in Tucson by Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer (twitphoto) ...

List Conservatives Questioning The Afghanistan War is Growing
The list of conservative who are questioning our involvement in Afghanistan is growing. Norquist joins a small, but growing list of prominent Conservatives who are questioning the war. One of the first prominent Conservatives to sound the alarm on Afghanistan was columnist (and former Press Secretary for then-Speaker Gingrich), Tony Blankley. Blankley has written several columns on the topic over the years. Questioning President Obama's strategy in Afgahanistan, Blankley recently wrote, "I do n...