U.S. cites evidence of assassination plot

America's worse sheriff
Image via Wikipedia IBD: It's bad enough that a fine congresswoman is shot down by a crazed assassin. But do those whose job it is to prevent such awful things have to insert their own base politics into the tragedy? As a key Law Enforcement figure in the Assassination attempt against Arizona Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik, a Democrat, might be expected to show some caution in commenting on the violent swirl of bitter, unsubstantiated and outright false accusation...

U.S. public says Giffords shooting, rhetoric unrelated
Most Americans see no relation between the attempted Assassination of congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords and the political tactic of lacing vitriolic Rhetoric with Firearms analogies. That’s the conclusion of a CBS News poll that found most Republicans (69 pct), most Independents (56 pct) and even a plurality of Democrats (49 pct) believe the two phenomena unrelated. Those numbers add up to 57 percent of Americans overall — a true majority though not quite big enough to break a Se...

Heritage Foundation whines, "It all started when he hit me back!"
Conservatives never take responsibility for anything: Slavery, segregation, Racism, coddling Hitler, Central American death squads, Pollution, mass Incarceration, three decades of Budget-busting Deficits, 9/11, Katrina, the Iraq War, the Wall Street meltdown & the Great Recession--the list goes on and on. So why would their reaction to the attempted Assassination of Gabrielle Giffords be any different? And it's not, as the Heritage Foundation whines, "It all started when he hit me back!" Libe...

Most Americans Reject Tie Between Political Rhetoric, Arizona Shootings
While the Arizona shootings have triggered a national debate about whether the vitriol in political Rhetoric has gone over the top, 57 percent of Americans do not believe the heated partisan tone of public debate had anything to do with the gun rampage in Tucson, according to a CBS News poll released Tuesday. The connection between the state of political discourse and the shootings that critically wounded Arizon Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, killed six and injured 13 others had perhaps been put most ...

Fox New Website Continues Partisan Attack On Sheriff Dupnik's "Vitriol" Comments
If Propaganda is to be believed, it should be repeated. Yesterday, in both an interview on "Fox & Friends" and an article on the Fox News website, Fox News featured critical commentary about Pima County Sheriff's remarks about the vitriol in our society - vitriol that, as he stated, is promulgated by the media. Obviously needing to deflect and divert from the appropriate substance of Dupnik's comments, Fox is maintaining its seeming scapegoating of the sheriff. Today's headline (first under the ...

Tucson Sheriff sticks foot in mouth over Rush Limbaugh comment!
Having an opinion is one thing, but making your opinion public can have Unintended Consequences.  And yes, even for Pima Count, AZ Sheriff, Clarence Dupnik, that rule applies.  Yesterday, he may have inadvertently stuck his foot in his mouth with his Rhetoric about Rush Limbaugh.  Take for instance, the comments made by Dupnik.  Yesterday in an interview, he told Diane Sawyer of ABCNews  that; Really?!  Do you really think he listens to Limbaugh's program, or is he ...

The Unstable Sheriff of Pima County, AZ
Jim Geraghty in his Morning Jolt email takes on Sheriff Clarence Dupnik (pronounced "Dumbsh....") who has managed both to neglect his duties AND try and dismantle the First Amendment: Say this for Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik. He may have dropped the ball on numerous red flags and other signs of a potential threat from the Tucson gunman, and he certainly didn't bother to assign any deputies or other police personnel to the "Congress on Your Corner" event that turned into a massacre, des...

AZ Sheriff Dever: Killer Alone Responsible for Shooting, Frightening To Try To Lay Blame On Anyone Elses Doorstep
Tuesday, January 11, 2011 By Penny Starr Sheriff Larry Dever of Cochise County, Ariz. (Cochise County Sheriff's Department photo) (CNSNews.com) - Cochise County Sheriff Larry Dever said he does not understand why his friend and colleague, Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik, would suggest at a news conference following Saturday's shooting in Tucson that political ideology played a role in the tragedy. At a Press Conference on Saturday, Dupnik said Arizona had become the “mecc

TOP ARIZONA PAPER Blasts Sheriff Dupnik: Get a Grip!
A top Arizona paper today blasted Far Left Sheriff Clarence Dupnik for his continued attacks on the law-abiding people of Arizona. Dupnik was on with Keith Olbermann last night. On Saturday afternoon, with his friend Gabby Giffords in surgery fighting for her life, Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik railed against the tense partisan politics - “the anger, the hatred, the Bigotry” - that prompted the mass Murders outside Tucson, in his view. And, jarring as such claims ma...

Arizona's Sheriff Dupnik and the 'vitriol' debate: Do words matter that much?
Yes, they do. Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik is being criticized for his comments linking Saturday's shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and others to antigovernment vitriol. But he's right: The words we use carry great power to shape how we respond to others....

Friends, Critics Dispute Arizona Sheriffs Remarks on Political Rhetoric in Wake of Rampage
Just hours after Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, an Arizona Democrat, was shot in the head by a crazed gunman, Pima County Sheriff Clarence W. Dupnik — addressing the media for the first time — made headlines for saying that “vitriolic political rhetori......

Security a top priority at public gatherings
U.S. Reps. Gene Green and Ted Poe tried not to let the cold, gray weather further dampen the mood on an already somber Monday afternoon as they spoke at a ribbon cutting ceremony just two days after a shooting rampage in Tucson, Ariz., left one of their colleagues fighting for her life. Green, D-Houston, and Poe, R-Humble, used pairs of 2-foot-long scissors to cut a ribbon and joked with the two dozen onlookers standing on a towering freeway interchange in Baytown. They were back to business, ...

In They Are Who We Thought They Were News..
I had put this in the replies in yesterday’s Afternoon Open Thread, but I thought about it, and decided to FP it. In an apparent effort to distance themselves from the Mass Shootings in Arizona over the weekend, the Tea Party Express sent out an email to supporters proclaiming that they “won’t be silenced” — and asking for contributions. Earlier today, TPE leader Sal Russo went on Fox News and lamented how “revolting and disgusting the left is for trying to as...

Obama Will Attend Tucson Memorial Service
President Obama will attend the memorial service on Wednesday in Tucson for those killed in Saturday’s shootings. Expect a lecture. President Obama will travel to Arizona on Wednesday to attend a memorial service for those killed in Saturday’s shootings that targeted Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) for Assassination, according to a White House official. The news that Obama would visit Tucson, where six people were killed and more than a dozen others were wounded by a gunmen on Sat...

Have gun, Will talk: Arizona Sheriff Clarence Dupnik not speechless over Tucson shootings or much else
For a chief Law Enforcement officer who's supposed to be assembling the complex Criminal Investigations of six sudden homicides against a local 22-year-old suspect, Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik sure has found ample time the last couple of days to appear all over national News Media, spouting prickly opinions on pretty much anything asked. The sheriff, who celebrates his 75th birthday today, is understandably defensive. He had no officers at Rep. Gabrielle Giffords ' Saturday ope...

ARIZONA REPUBLIC blasts Sheriff Dupnik...
On Saturday afternoon, with his friend Gabby Giffords in surgery fighting for her life, Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik railed against the tense partisan politics - "the anger, the hatred, the Bigotry" - that prompted the mass Murders outside Tucson, in his view. And, jarring as such claims may be, we understood. Or tried to understand, despite the spectacle of a lawman - an official whose very job it is to dispassionately gather facts and to maintain order and calm - tying the attack on Rep...

What good does this do Brian Terry and Gabrielle Giffords?
Brian Terry was the Border Patrol agent who was killed by Mexican bandits a few weeks ago on the Arizona-Mexico border. Gabrielle Giffords is the congresswoman who was seriously shot Saturday in Tucson by a gunman. Not much was made of Brian Terry’s Murder. There was a Funeral. Janet Napolitano came to the funeral and chided Terry’s family for complaining that their son was not kept safe enough and that was the end of it. When it surfaced that the reason Terry was killed was that Nap...

For Rep. Giffords, No News Is Good News Right Now
This is a rush transcript from "On the Record," January 10, 2011. This copy may not be in its final form and may be updated. GRETA VAN SUSTEREN, Fox News HOST: At this hour Congresswoman Giffords is fighting to stay alive. Griff Jenkins spoke to her chief neurosurgeon. GRIFF JENKINS, Fox News CORRESPONDENT: We are with Dr. Michael Lemole, chief of Neurosurgery here at the University Medical Center. Doctor, what can you tell us about the latest with Representative Giffords' state? DR. MICHAEL LEM...

The Tucson tragedy: over the line
I gasped when I saw the picture on my Facebook news feed. Joe Jervis, creator of the widely followed gay blog Joe.My.God, posted a separated at birth-like coupling of alleged Tucson murderer Jared Lee Loughner and Fox News's Glenn Beck. Folks, this is despicable. Beck may be a fire-breathing blowhard who doesn't deserve the mass following he has for the vitriol he spews daily, but to equate him with the twisted monster who stands accused of killing a 9-year-old girl and a Federal Judge and crit...

Sheriff Dupnik Spoke Out Against Conceal & Carry Laws
Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik has been a vocal critic of conceal and carry laws in Arizona. Dupnik believed that such laws would further endanger innocent bystanders in these situations. Recent multiple homicides on college campuses, like those that occurred at Virginia Tech and Northern Illinois University, have inflamed the national community and brought about a call to arms that is at once understandable and dangerous. Currently, 13 states are considering Legislation that would allow i...

Doc: 'Hopefully she'll live to be 95'
Physicians at the University of Arizona Medical Center issued their most optimistic assessment yet of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords’s condition, with trauma specialist Dr. Peter Rhee telling a British Television Station that she was “100 percent likely to survive” the gunshot wound she sustained Saturday. “As a physician I’m going to get into a lot of trouble for this, but her prognosis for survival is 100 percent, as far as it being short term,” he said. “H...

Double Standards
Rush Limbaugh and the right wingers are all over Sheriff Clarence Dupnik for having the temerity to express an opinion about the causes of the shootings in Tucson last weekend.Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik thrust himself into the spotlight in the aftermath of the shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) and 19 other people in Arizona on Saturday, decrying the heated political atmosphere and calling for more civility. "It's not unusual for all public officials to get threats constantly, ...

Early Morning Swim: Sherrod Brown and Rachel Maddow Discuss Violence in Our Politics
Meanwhile, God bless Sheriff Dupnik. The Arizona sheriff investigating the Tucson shooting that left U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords critically wounded had harsh words today for those engaging in political Rhetoric, calling conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh “irresponsible” for continuing the vitriol. “The kind of rhetoric that flows from people like Rush Limbaugh, in my judgment he is irresponsible, uses partial information, sometimes wrong information,” Pima County Sh...

Doctor: Giffords's condition unchanged
A top doctor at the Hospital treating Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) for a gunshot wound to the head said the congresswoman's condition has not changed and that her ability to fully recover is still uncertain. "No, there is no change, and as frustrating as that may sound, that's a good thing," Dr. Michael Lemole, the chief of Neurosurgery at the University Medical Center in Tucson, said on NBC's "Today" show.  Doctors have remained cautiously optimistic of Giffords's chances for a full re...

Loughner makes his first public appearance after being charged over Tucson rampage
A mugshot of Jared Loughner released by Pima County Sheriff's Office. Jared Lee Loughner, accused of Murder and Attempted Murder of federal employees including US congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords, has appeared  in Federal Court in Phoenix and will continue to be held for future hearings. Loughner, 22, appeared before Magistrate Judge Lawrence Anderson on a five-count complaint that alleged he attempted to assassinate Giffords, who remains hospitalised in critical condition after Saturday's...