U.S. Congresswoman Gabrielle Gifford Shot In The Head

The 40-year-old Democrat, who was re-elected to her third term in November, was hosting a “Congress on Your Corner” event at a Safeway in northwest Tucson when a gunman ran up and started shooting, according to Peter Michaels, news director of Arizona Public Media.  (source: NPR).

There are conflicting report as to whether she is dead or in very serious condition (see update below). But an aide have been killed and several injured. An elementary kid was also reportedly shot (according to posters at reddit.com) as the suspect randomly fired shots before attempting to flee.

It is still too early to know whether the suspect was motivated by political hate. But the congresswoman was on Sarah Palin’s target list on her campaign to “reload” and had targeted several congressman/woman. Sarah Palin have also created controversy when she called for assassination of Wikileak’s Julian Assange.  Such kind of comment, similar to that of Canada’s Tom Flanagan, always worries me that it would inspire wacko’s to carry out the deed. As a redditer poster by the name of MeanestBossEver have pointed out:

A year ago a gun was dropped at a town hall meeting she had.

9 months ago the glass front door of her Tuscon office was smashed a few hours after she voted on the health care bill.

Whether this shooting is politically motivated or not, the fact remains that political hate speech propagated by politicians and Fox News need to stop. Especially one calling explicitly for assassination of any individual. Joke or not I’ll bet an individual won’t get away with calling for killing of politicians on their Facebook.

Update: 3:13 pm eastern time: Suspect is identified as Jared Laughner. Congresswoman is reported to be out of surgery and responding to commands.

There’s a link to a Jared Lee Loughner Youtube page from Tucson Arizona and who is a military recruit. Some news outlet had reported that he is an Afghanistan veteran. (h/t   TheWurx from Dailykos ) His final video started with “My final thoughts”. And seems to be delusional and believe in irrational conspiracy claim such as government is controlling people’s mind by controlling grammar.  Correction: CNN reported today (Jan 9, 2011) that Jared tried to enlist in the Army in 2008 but was rejected. (CNN)

Update 7:12 pm Eastern time. Federal Judge John Roll confirmed to have been killed. He was at the same location as Gabrielle Gifford. John Roll was under 24 hour protection at one point due to hundreds of threat against him. (Slate.com). The 9 year old kid is now being reported as having been killed also along with 4 others. My condolences to the loved ones of those who have been killed senselessly.