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On April 3, 1981, the Associated Press published a story headlined "Sheriff Tells Residents to Arm Themselves for Protection." The top paragraph of the story, datelined Tucson, said: "Sheriff Clarence Dupnik has advised Pima County residents to arm themselves because his decimated department lacks the manpower to protect them." "Not only are things not good, they are going to get worse," Dupnik said at a meeting with residents of an area called Avra Valley, according to the Associated Press. "For those who are so inclined, it's time to start protecting yourselves." The Associated Press added: "He said he was not...

In the race to see which politico makes the biggest ass out of himself over the shooting spree in Tucson, Arizona, we can report that so far the frontrunners appear to be Rep. James Clyburn of South Carolina and former Senator Bob Kerrey of Nebraska, both Democrats. In a rambling interview on the radio with Ed Schultz, Clyburn complains about people attempting to “delegitimize the President” and suggested that the reading of the Constitution in Congress last week had something to do with the shooting. Real Clear Politics has the audio [see update II]: “All [of] this stuff taking place...

Sheriff Dupnik appeared on MSNBC’s Countdown with Keith Oblermann and said he has a ‘legal responsibility’ to place blame for the shooting tragedy in Tucson, Arizona. It just so happens he’s blaming the likes of Sharron Angle and Sarah Palin for being responsible for the massacre. During the interview he also tries to explain how he’s not politicizing the situation. Automatically placing blame on ‘right-wing rhetoric’ seems as if it pretty much fits the bill for politicization of a tragedy.

This afternoon, I saw perhaps the most troubling, irresponsible, disconnected-from-reality editorial cartoon I’ve ever seen published in a major American newspaper. It’s one thing to hastily jump to conclusions before the facts are known, but it’s another to stick to those hasty conclusions in the face of contradictory facts. Unfortunately, that’s what cartoonist Jeff Danziger is doing. In all my years in politics, I have never contacted an editorial cartoonist, but I was so appalled by this cartoon, that today I did. To my surprise, Danziger replied. Below is our full exchange: —— Mr Danziger – I’ve worked professionally in...

Almost instantaneously the horrific shooting in Tucson, Ariz., became the occasion for partisan hatred. It’s one thing to charge your opponents with increasing the debt or serving the interests of the rich; it’s quite another to say they are accomplices to mass murder. In the ostensible (and always worthy) cause of civility, prominent liberals rushed to blame conservatives, and especially Sarah Palin, for the mayhem in Tucson. Palin’s offense was posting a map on Facebook with a bull’s-eye marking the districts of 20 Democrats she wished to see defeated. On the list was Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, the target of Tucson...

In the wake of Saturday's shooting rampage in Arizona, a more detailed picture is emerging of Jared Lee Loughner, the man police have accused of opening fire. Loughner, 22, who is in law enforcement custody, lives near the scene of the shooting, which killed six people and injured at least a dozen others, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik said there's reason to believe Loughner has "a mental issue" and described him as "unhinged." Dupnik said he believed Giffords was the target of the attack. "As we understand it, there have been law enforcement contacts with the...

While Paul Krugman and other liberal commentators continue to exploit this weekend's tragedy by making hay out of supposedly extreme rhetoric on the right, perhaps they would do well to examine some of the rhetoric that has come from the left. On October 23, The Scranton Times reported that Rep. Paul Kanjorski, D-Pa., said this about Florida's new Republican Governor Rick Scott: "That Scott down there that's running for governor of Florida," Mr. Kanjorski said. "Instead of running for governor of Florida, they ought to have him and shoot him. Put him against the wall and shoot him. He stole...

USA Today so headline and link only.

President Barack Obama will fly to Tucson, Ariz., on Wednesday for a memorial to commemorate the victims of Saturday’s shooting, a senior administration official confirmed Monday. SNIP

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 Sheriff Clarence Dupnik said today. "[Limbaugh] attacks people, angers them against government, angers them against elected officials and that kind of behavior in my opinion is not without consequences." Limbaugh today railed against the media and Dupnik for trying...

Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik once again blames conservative rhetoric for being responsible for the shooting of Rep. Gabby Giffords (AZ). "The kind of rhetoric that flows from people like Rush Limbaugh, in my judgment, he's irresponsible, uses partial information, sometimes wrong information. Attacks people, angers them against government, angers them against elected officials and that kind of behavior, in my opinion, is without consequences and I think he's irresponsible," Sheriff Dupnik told ABC News.

Jared Lee Loughner, the 22-year-old Arizona man charged with killing six people and injuring 12 others, including U.S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords, clearly scared more than a few people. Instructors at his college, as well as friends and neighbors, have said they expressed concerns about Loughner's behavior in the months before he opened fire at a gathering at a Tucson shopping mall on Saturday. [Snip} "While his behavior seemed to be disturbing, there is not any indication (he posed) a direct or imminent danger. One thing that will come up -- are mentally ill folks more violent because of mental illness...

TUCSON, AZ - The suspect in a deadly Tucson shooting is being held without bail and has been assigned a lawyer who defended Oklahoma City bombing conspirator Timothy McVeigh. Jared Loughner entered the courtroom Monday handcuffed and wearing a tan inmate uniform. His head is shaved and he has a cut on his right temple. Loughner made his initial court appearance in federal court at 2 p.m. at the Sandra Day O’Connor U.S. Courthouse, while state charges have yet to be filed. The court set Loughner’s preliminary hearing for Jan. 24.

Gabrielle Giffords shooting: Frightening, twisted shrine in Arizona killer Jared Lee Loughner's yard BY Matthew Lysiak In Tucson and Lukas I. Alpert DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITERS Monday, January 10th 2011, 4:00 AM DAILY NEWS EXCLUSIVEMiniature altar with human skull replica in backyard tent at Jared Lee Loughner's home. DAILY NEWS EXCLUSIVETent containing shrine in Jared Lee Loughner's Tucson backyard. Related NewsArticles Giffords' husband blames inflammatory rhetoric for shootingBystanders help subdue Arizona killerA sinister shrine reveals a chilling occult dimension in the mind of the deranged gunman accused of shooting a member of Congress and 19 others. Hidden within a camouflage...

James Kelley, who blogs at The Cholla Jumps, recently published a post titled “Jared Loughner is a product of Sheriff Dupnik’s office” which consists of some pretty damaging information if found to be true. It reads: This is the report that Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik has been dreading since the tragic event on Saturday January 8. The sheriff has been editorializing and politicizing the event since he took the podium to report on the incident. His blaming of radio personalities and bloggers is a pre-emptive strike because Mr. Dupnik knows this tragedy lays at his feet and his office....

The now infamous Arizona sheriff Clarence Dupnik, who has blamed Sarah Palin and Sharron Angle for the shootings in Arizona, was on a round table talk show a couple months ago. He delivered an extremely convoluted message about guns. Check out this clip of that round table (the full video which includes some talk about mental illness treatment can be found here): So, uh, what is his message here? First he says that he can’t think of a single incident where armed citizens have stopped a crime, which is absurd, but then he goes on to say that he wouldn’t...

Pima Country Sheriff Dupnik appeared on Fox News in which he directly blamed Sharron Angle and Sarah Palin for the shootings that occurred in Tuscon, Arizona that critically injured Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, killed 6 others, and injured at least 12 others. Dupnik said “When you have people like Sharron Angle in Las Vegas running against Harry Reid making outrageous statements such as ‘we need to resort taking the 2nd amendment into certain cases’ and for people like Sarah Palin to say ‘we have people like Gabby Giffords in our crossairs’, I think those statements are totally irresponsible and they’re not...

It's 4:40 pm on Saturday, January 8th and I'm in the car waiting for my son. It was a relaxing Saturday oriented around sports and family. My cell phone rings and it's an unfamiliar number, so I let it go into voice mail as I usually do with numbers I don't recognize. I continue reading my book when, a few minutes later, it rings again with the same number. With only a few pages left, I hold off listening to the voice mail and read on. I finally get a chance to listen to the message a few minutes before...

The criminal complaint federal prosecutors filed Sunday against the alleged shooter, Jared Loughner, goes to some lengths to demonstrate that Roll didn't show up at the Giffords event just to say hello to the congresswoman, or on some whim after attending mass, as reports Saturday suggested. That storyline was fueled by Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik, who said "because [Roll] knows Gabrielle very well, [he] came around the corner to say hi. Unfortunately he was in the wrong place at the wrong time." By contrast, FBI agent Tony Taylor argues that Roll was at the event to talk to Giffords...

..."I'd just like to say that when you look at unbalanced people, how they are - how they respond to the vitriol that comes out of certain mouths, about tearing down the government, the anger, the hatred, the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous," Pima County Sheriff Clarence W. Dupnik said in a nationally televised news conference. He followed it up with an encore TV appearance Sunday, calling Arizona the "tombstone of the United States" for its lax gun laws and railing against "the rhetoric about hatred, about mistrust of government, about paranoia of...