Gabrielle Giffords

"The Newtown families and Gabby Giffords are in the gun debate to stay, and over time their voices will be more powerful than the NRA."

So said Newsweek's Eleanor Clift during the predictions segment on PBS's McLaughlin Group Friday (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

The gun-hating media are convinced that background checks are the panacea that will prevent mass shootings in the future.

Don't include Chris Wallace amongst them for on the most recent installment of Fox News Sunday, the host told gun control activist Mark Kelly that a background check didn't prevent Jared Loughner from purchasing the weapon he shot Kelly's wife Gabrielle Giffords with in January 2011 (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Viewers who tuned in to Wednesday's The Situation Room were bombarded with over five times as much coverage of gun control advocates than of the lone gun rights advocate Newt Gingrich.

Host Wolf Blitzer tossed plenty of softball questions to gun control advocates Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) and Mark Kelly, husband of former Congresswoman Gabby Giffords (D-Ariz.), but he grilled Gingrich on background checks.

New York Times reporter Peter Baker explored the metaphorical challenges of the gun debate: "In Debate Over Curbing Gun Violence, Even Language Can Be Loaded." It was a politically balanced, if perhaps oversensitive, analysis, until an unfair reference tying Sarah Palin, the former GOP vice presidential candidate, to the shooting by schizophrenic Jared Loughner of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. It's a false tie the Times has exploited before. An excerpt:

CNN did its best to promote former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords' push for stricter gun laws on Tuesday. Correspondent David Mattingly even highlighted the large "donate" button on the website of Giffords' new political action committee.

"And if you think about it, if Gabby Giffords came knocking on my door, office door on Capitol Hill, I would have to let her in," swooned anchor Carol Costello. Mattingly directed viewers to her website's fundraising section: "[I]f you go to the website that they've set up now, the Americans for Responsible Solutions, the first thing you see there is a big window where you can click on it to donate." [Video below the break. Audio here.]

At the end of a Friday interview with Mark Kelly, former astronaut and husband of former Congresswoman Gabrille Giffords, Today co-host Savannah Guthrie made sure to bring up the favorite liberal talking point of the need for more gun control: "...you gave a stinging rebuke in your statement to political leaders who haven't done anything about gun control....What do you hope will change? And are you expecting President Obama to do something about gun control in a second term?"

Kelly avoided putting the President on hook: "I don't expect him to in the beginning part of his second term. But, you know...we have a Congress that can address it as well." He then argued: "...it's obviously a problem. I mean, we have gun violence that happens time and time again in this country. And I think almost everybody would agree that we have a problem....repeatedly we lost the opportunity and I hope somebody, you know, picks up that mantle and tries to do something about it." Guthrie agreed: "Well, this obviously underscores the need for the issue to be addressed in some way."

Remember all those demands for civility in politics after the tragic shooting of Arizona Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords in January, 2011?

On Tuesday's Hardball, MSNBC's Chris Matthews said, "I’m with' [the Obama campaign] putting the knife in" Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney for the supposed outsourcing that happened at companies Bain Capital invested in (video follows with transcript and commentary):

On the night before the special election in Arizona to fill former Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords' seat, CNN's Piers Morgan gave some last-minute positive airtime to Giffords' hand-picked Democratic candidate. He hosted both the candidate Ron Barber and Giffords' husband Mark Kelly on Monday for a soft interview.

In what set the tone for the rest of the interview, Morgan began with a rousing clip of Mark Kelly announcing that "This is more than just an ordinary election," and touting that "this is closure on Gabby's career in Congress." [Video below the break.]

Former Democratic congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords retired from office a year after suffering a gunshot wound to the head, and CNN is already goading her husband to replace her in Congress. Since Democrats wanted him to run for Giffords' seat, CNN was basically asking a Democrat to run for office.

On Friday's Starting Point, host Soledad O'Brien told Giffords' husband, retired astronaut Mark Kelly, that historically "often spouses will jump in and take over their spouse's Congressional seat." She strongly insinuated that would be him, and that he should run. [Video below the break. Click here for audio.]

One year ago, America's media were shouting from the rooftops about the need for more civil political discourse following the tragic shooting of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.).

Less than three days after the anniversary of that horrible event, the gang at MSNBC's Morning Joe gleefully discussed how Mitt Romney is going to "kill" any of his Republican presidential opponents that try to attack him (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

If you had to name the top U.S. news story of 2011, what would you say?

For the folks at Time magazine, the answer is the Occupy Wall Street protests:

Although it's long been proved that Sarah Palin and so-called violent political rhetoric had absolutely nothing to do with January's tragic shootings in Tucson, Arizona, CNN's Piers Morgan felt it was necessary to bring her up during Wednesday's interview with Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords' (D-Ariz.) husband.

For his part, astronaut Mark Kelly was only too happy to take the bait and run with it (video follows with transcript and commentary):

ABC presented an absolutely marvelous special Tuesday evening about Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords' (D-Ariz.) remarkable recovery from a gunshot to the head last January.

After 36 minutes of uplifting scenes involving the Congresswoman's therapy and road back to being able to walk and speak, host Diane Sawyer for some reason felt the need to bring politics into the program at its conclusion while taking a truly pathetic swipe at former Alaska governor Sarah Palin (video follows with transcript and commentary):

CBS's Erica Hill tossed softballs at a survivor of the Tucson shooting and the executive director of a pro-gun control group on Tuesday's Early Show, just hours before they were due to speak at a congressional hearing to promote tighter gun regulations. Hill played up fellow survivor Rep. Gabrielle Giffords's recent interview and asked, "What does that do to you and to this cause that you have now adopted?"

The anchor led the 8 am Eastern hour of the morning show by playing a clip of ABC's Diane Sawyer asking the Arizona representative about the January 2011 shooting. Hill then gushed over Giffords's recovery as she introduced her guests- Patricia Maisch, who helped subdue Jared Loughner, and Mark Glaze of Mayors Against Illegal Guns: "I know that watching the recovery...has been encouraging in ways that are probably tough to describe."

Remember all that talk about returning civility to political discussions following Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords' (D-Ariz.) shooting in January?

Washington Post columnist Ruth Marcus clearly doesn't, for on ABC's This Week Sunday, she said of Texas governor Rick Perry's presidential candidacy, "He's like Monty Python's parrot - he's not dead yet" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

CBS's Erica Hill let DNC Chair Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz bash congressional Republicans unopposed on Thursday's Early Show. Hill also failed to ask the Florida Democrat about her eye-opening claim on Wednesday that "anyone" can see that the economy is improving "and now, we've begun to turn the corner."

The anchor brought on Wasserman Schultz, the morning show's only political guest, for a softball interview on the recovery of her friend and colleague, Rep. Gabrielle Giffords. Near the end of the segment, though, Hill raised President Obama's jobs bill: "Is there anything that you found, in talking with your colleagues on either side of the aisle, that you think can bring lawmakers together in Washington, to find some sort of compromise that will satisfy as close to everyone as you can get?"

Not surprisingly, MSNBC’s Ed Schultz was practically orgasmic with joy Tuesday over Teamsters president James Hoffa’s Labor Day declaration of war against the Tea Party.

After telling his “Ed Show” audience that Obama’s poll numbers have been declining because he hasn’t spoken to the American people like the union boss, Schultz actually asked Hoffa, “Do you think the Republicans are sons of b---hes?” (video follows with transcribed highlights and commentary):

National Review's Jonah Goldberg on Tuesday, appearing on Fox News's "Special Report," put James Hoffa's Labor Day attack on the Tea Party in proper perspective.

"We would not be in this mess, we would not have this controversy, if we did not have this bonfire of asininity that came out of the Tucson shootings where all of a sudden Sarah Palin’s Facebook Congressional map was somehow to blame for not only this madman but for all of the violence overtaking America" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

There's something to be said for candor, even -- make that, especially -- from a goo-goo leftist.

None of this disingenuous denial that Vice President Joe Biden maligned Republicans as terrorists, or the weaselly pseudo-defense that Biden didn't actually say this, he merely agreed after a House Democrat did. (audio clip after page break)

Monday night, to the surprise of many, Rep. Gabrielle Giffords returned to the Capitol to cast her first vote since being shot in the head by Jared Lee Loughner seven months ago. Her triumphant return brought cheers from everyone in the room, despite their contentious disagreements over the past few weeks.

Ironically, these disagreements have often turned to using the same violent rhetoric that was so widely blamed by the media as the reason for Loughner's violent shooting spree. In reality, martial rhetoric is virtually ubiquitous in our political system, but the same people who condemned it seven months ago are now hypocritically using the same language, having no problem calling Tea Partiers "terrorists," "kidnappers," or congressmen on a "suicide mission."

At the conclusion of a fractious national debate about the debt ceiling, a truly marvelous moment occurred Monday when Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) returned to the House floor after being shot in the head almost seven months ago.

Apparently unable to control himself, the sadly getting more and more disgraceful Chris Matthews chose to mar the emotional homecoming by connecting her shooting to the Tea Party and "the violent level of the right-wing" (video follows with transcript and commentary):

Today Tucson congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) cast her first vote since she was critically injured in a January shooting.

You'll recall that in the weeks that followed, the media bemoaned the incivility -- supposedly predominantly conservative in nature -- of the political debate which had allegedly created a climate of hate.

But there appears to to be no firestorm over how, just last week, Arizona Daily Star cartoonist David Fitzsimmons fantasized about President Obama sending a SEAL team to assassinate Tea Party-friendly House Republicans.

See the political cartoon below the page break or find it linked here:

Throughout his tenure, there have been several facets in which President Obama has been demonstrably weak on leadership, with the debt debate coming to the forefront in recent months.  Now however, lost in that news cycle has been another failure of leadership for the President – his own request to tone down violent rhetoric in this country.  For it was mere months ago that Obama stood in front of a crowd in Tucson that had anxiously sought leadership amidst the chaos of the Gabrielle Giffords shooting; a teachable moment that had The Guardian gushing about how the President had delivered “calm amid the toxic rhetoric.”

That moment of calm has long since dissipated.  Where once the President had denounced discourse that places “the blame for all that ails the world at the feet of those who think differently than we do”, we hear Republicans blamed for holding the American people hostage to their economic policies.  Where once we were urged to talk “with each other in a way that heals, not a way that wounds”, we now hear Tea Party members being denounced as terrorists.

Make no mistake, this ratcheting up of terrorism and hostage-taking discourse directly coincides with recent events in Norway.  The instant that Oslo terrorist, Anders Behring Breivik, was labeled as a ‘right-wing Christian’, liberals finally had their moment to seize upon - not just a chance to label conservatives as extreme ideologues but a chance to label them as violent ideologues.  This message has been a coordinated and vicious attack amongst the media, the Democrats, and most assuredly, the President.

Remember all that talk about toning down the violent rhetoric following the tragic shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords (D-Ariz.) in January?

Such good intentions certainly don't apply when talking about former Alaska governor Sarah Palin as comedian Christopher Titus demonstrated this weekend at the Irvine Improv in Southern California (audio follows courtesy Daily Caller with partial transcript and commentary):

Remember all that talk four months ago in the wake of the Tucson shootings that political commentators needed to tone down their rhetoric?

MSNBC's Chris Matthews certainly doesn't, for on Monday's "Hardball," he called Rep. Paul Ryan's (R-Wisc.) Medicare plan a 'killer politically" and a "death certificate" for Republicans (video follows with transcript and commentary):

CNN’s Piers Morgan Tonight has been such a parade of celebrity interviews it’s almost made Larry King Live look like a hard-news show. But on Wednesday night, Morgan interviewed Ted Nugent and pounded him repeatedly and personally, especially insulting him as a “draft dodger.” He also suggested he was homophobic and not compassionate toward the poor.

Morgan naturally picked a big fight on the Second Amendment, which he declared “the reality is you end up with what happened to Gabby Giffords in Tucson.” Morgan insisted to Nugent, “Eighty people a day die in America from gunshots.” Nugent replied, “Kiss my ass...You are playing the idiot’s advocate.” The gun talk began when Morgan ran video of Nugent suggesting Obama should suck on his machine gun:

You might think most rappers aren’t exactly Shakespeare, but left-wing radio talker Randi Rhodes was implying that connection on Wednesday when it came to the rapper Common’s "poetry" at the Obama White House. "He’s brilliant, he’s absolutely brilliant," she asserted. And conservatives would oppose Shakespeare, too:

Look, the conservatives, if Shakespeare were alive, and he went to the White House to get, you know, some sort of a reading, they would be outraged about him -- talking about killing his brother, and the father had to go, and a mother he slept with -- They'd be out of their fricking minds with this. They don't understand culture! Or literature!

Rhodes also asserted on Wednesday that it was somehow a Tea Party member that shot Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, despite ample evidence to the contrary.