The alleged assailant has been identified as 22-year-old Jared Lee Loughner, an Arizona resident described by one eyewitness as a white, clean-cut man who reportedly called out the names of some of his victims as he began shooting. (The Associated Press identified the suspect, who's now in police custody, as Jared Laughner, but the Arizona Daily Star, Politico, and other outlets have ID'd him as "Loughner.") The suspect appears to have posted YouTube videos under the handle "Classitup10" that rail against the government and talk of revolution and terrorism. The user, identified as "Jared Lee Loughner," says in a rage-filled, rambling, and incoherent post accompanying one video:
We need a drum roll for those front runners in the election; those illegal teachers, pigs, and politicians of yours are under illegal authority of their constitution. Those dirty pigs think they know the damn year. Thirdly, tell them mother fuckers to count from 0 to whenever they feel a threat to stop their count…Those illegal military personal are able to sign into a country that they can't find with an impossible date! How did you trust your child with them fraud teachers and front runners, listener? Did you now know that the teachers, pigs, and front runners are treasonous!In another video, the same user accuses the government of imposing "mind control and brainwash on the people by controlling grammar." Loughner continues: "You don't have to accept hte [SIC] federalist laws…A terrorist is a person who employs terror or terrorism, especially as a political weapon. If you call me a terrorist then the argument to call me a terrorist is Ad hominem."
Giffords, a moderate Democrat, had been threatened in the recent past. Shortly after the health care vote, Giffords' district office was vandalized, and extremists subsequently encouraged the public to throw bricks through the windows of lawmakers, as my colleague James Ridgeway has reported. (Other Democratic supporters were also subject to violent threats and attacks on their offices.) In the summer of 2009, Giffords' aides called the police after an attendee at a public event dropped a gun. The 40-year-old Arizona Democrat barely squeaked by her opponent in 2010, winning by less than one percentage point against the tea party-backed Jesse Kelly. The Tucson event was her first public appearance since her re-election.
Rep. Raul Grijalva, another Arizona Democrat, was also recently threatened with violence: in July, a bullet was fired through the window of his district office in Yuma, and an envelope with a toxic powder was sent to his Tucson office.
Rep. Grijalva: After Giffords Shooting, Tea Party and Palin Better Watch It
| Sat Jan. 8, 2011 3:36 PM PST
In the wake of the attempted assassination of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) and the shooting of more than 20 others in Tucson today, fellow Arizona Democrat Rep. Raul Grijalva denounced a political environment poisoned by "anger, hatred, and division." In a phone interview with Mother Jones, Grijalva called the assault "horrible and unbelievable and shocking….It's hard to explain and really difficult to comprehend." Grijalva—who was also the recent target of violent threats—went on to blame the polarized political climate for creating an atmosphere that fueled violence:
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2011/01/grijalva-giffords-shooting-tea-party-palin
FROM THINKPROGRESS
Giffords' opponent in the recent election, Jesse Kelly, held a campaign event in June where participants were invited to shoot an automatic weapon with the candidate, which was advertised as a chance to "get on target for victory in November help remove Gabrielle Giffords from office":
We never entered [politics] believing that we were taking our lives in our hands...we're feeding anger, hatred, and division for quite a while. Maybe it is time for elected officials and leaders in this country that have been feeding that disease to realize that there are consequences to it. I hope people stop and think that we can be opponents, but we don't have to be deadly enemies…to demonize another person because of a disagreement and to make them expendible is not a democracy, it's not the America I know.Asked whether the tea party right deserved to be singled out for particular blame, Grijalva assented:
[When] you stoke these flames, and you go to public meetings and you scream at the elected officials, you threaten them—you make us expendable you make us part of the cannon fodder. For a while, you've been feeding this hatred, this division…you feed it, you encourage it….Something's going to happen. People are feeding this monster….Some of the extreme right wing has made demonization of elected officials their priority.A number of prominent left-wing blogs, including Daily Kos and FireDogLake, also blamed Sarah Palin for fanning the flames by placing Giffords—along with other vulnerable Democratic members of Congress—literally in the crosshairs on a map during the midterm elections. Grijalva said that the Palin "apparatus" shares responsibility for creating a climate of extremism. "Both Gabby and I were targeted in the apparatus in that cycle [saying] these people are 'enemies.'" He concluded: "The Palin express better look at their tone and their tenor."
http://motherjones.com/mojo/2011/01/grijalva-giffords-shooting-tea-party-palin
FROM THINKPROGRESS
Giffords' opponent in the recent election, Jesse Kelly, held a campaign event in June where participants were invited to shoot an automatic weapon with the candidate, which was advertised as a chance to "get on target for victory in November help remove Gabrielle Giffords from office":
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