The Arizona Republic has a big package of one-year anniversary stories about the shootings in Tucson one year ago. Gabby Giffords was present at the dedication of the walking trail honoring Gabe Zimmerman, the staffer who died during the shooting. The Republic’s one-year roundup story notes that Gabe ran toward the shooting when it started.
Judge John Roll was remembered by his colleagues and co-workers on Friday. The new federal courthouse in Tucson Yuma will be named after him.
Here’s a story about Christina Taylor-Green’s mother and Suzi Hileman, the neighbor who took Christina to the event and who was also wounded when Christina was killed.
The Arizona Daily Star has a set of short statements from victims and their families.
jon
The new courthouse is in Yuma. Tucson already has a new courthouse, named after Evo DeConcini. And no, I don’t know who that is.
mistermix
@jon: Thanks, I fixed it. Wikipedia tells me Evo was a judge and, more importantly, former Senator Dennis DeConcini’s dad.
SiubhanDuinne
I expect most of us have vivid memories of first learning about that horror. I was at a theatre to see the Met Opera Live in HD and during a long intermission pulled out the BlackBerry to catch up on Balloon Juice. John had a post up, I think titled ominously Oh No, and at that early moment there were reports that Gabrielle Giffords had died, reports that didn’t get corrected for some time.* I had never even heard of her, but I burst into tears at the news. (Too bad for Puccini, but I doubt I’ll ever be able to see or hear La Fanciulla del West again without vivid horrible memories of nuts with guns — and it didn’t help that it’s an opera with a fair amount of gunplay.) Gaby Giffords’ remarkable and inspirational progress has been and continues to be nothing short of miraculous, but I wish I still had never heard of her, at least not for this.
*NPR was one of the early news organizations running with the erroneous report that Giffords had been killed in the attack. To their credit, they cited this in an end-of-the-year roundup of Worst Media Moments of 2011, I think on the weekly NPR program On the Media.
SiubhanDuinne
Tearing up again just reading some of those linked stories.
aimai
I just can’t revisit it. Its too horrific. On all counts but especially because I am a mother of a child Christina’s age and can well imagine having taken her to such an event myself.
aimai
sam
beep boppp booooooooop
Maude
@aimai:
I can’t go back to it either. You have company.
Mnemosyne
This year’s Rose Parade had me in tears because they have a float promoting organ donation every year and Christina Taylor-Green’s family agreed to ride on it.
Thatgaljill
This morning’s San Jose Mercury News has a story about Mitt Romney while he was a student protestor at Stanford :)
http://www.mercurynews.com/internal-affairs/ci_19700351?source=rss
Schlemizel
So much pain and suffering and pointless tragedy for no reason.
The only bright point is that Gabby is doing much better than we could ever hope. Thats small solace from such horror.
AxelFoley
Of all the tragedies from that day, I still can’t get over the loss of Christina. She seemed like such a sweet little angel. And she really wanted to make a difference when she grew up, from what I hear.
All she wanted to do was see her Congresswoman that day.
Jay in Oregon
Any quotes from the ghouls who were hoping that Giffords’ seat would have to be filled by a Republican?
How about the tinfoil-hat-wearing nutters that believed that the shooting was staged by Obama and Teh Ebbil Left to discredit gun owners?
Or the weekend warriors who thought that tragedy could have been averted if dozens of concealed-carry people were blasting away at anything that moved?
Trakker
I subscribe to the Associated Press U.S. news updates on my Kindle and hardly a day goes by that there isn’t an item about another shooting. Almost all are heartbreaking, like the soldier just back from Iraq who got shot trying to break up a fight and will now be paralyzed for life because some hot-headed punk had a gun.
And yet gun sales continue to soar. What kind of country are we?
The Ancient Randonneur
@aimai: Indeed, my mind can’t go there again, both of my daughters are young Christine’s age. I can imagine taking mine to such an event, and did take them to Occupy Boston to walk around and meet some of the people.
Elie
I fear that this thread is dead but please oh please, understand that mental health diagnosis and timely treatment is beyond abysmal in this country. There are many situations of young men and women who are undiagnosed and untreated for severe mental illnesss. Paranoids are the worst and most dangerous and we have few tools to identify and treat them — our schools do not identify the children early enough and their families are ashamed or in denial and frequently without resources. Many benefit packages provided by employers are limited in scope. The CHIP (children’ insurance provided by the Feds and States), program in VA only covers emergency care after a child is in crisis — not enough psychiatrists and therapists to treat children routinely.
This is the worst kind of injustice and no once is screaming about this.. We should be — before its too late for the next time — and there always is a next time. You know that.
Citizen_X
Not to depress people even further, but holy shit there are a lot of fascist scumbags in Arizona. I salute all the Arizonans fighting them (who are still fighting, so it’s ultimately not depressing).
Seriously, go read that article and the supporting links. Powerful teatards, like the Arizona AG and the AZ state superintendent, are in full jihad against Tucson’s acclaimed Ethnic Studies program. These guys are just two connections away (through, for example, Charles Pearce) to white power groups, so the “fascist scumbags” is not hyperbole. But, as I said, people there continue to fight.
Citizen_X
@Elie: From the article I linked above:
Elie
@Citizen_X:
We.never.connect.the.dots. Ever.
I hope that someone who suffered injury or other loss in this tragedy can perhaps one day lead the way to enlightenned awareness to change this. What more powerful example is there?
dww44
@Trakker: My city and county had the highest gun sales ever during the period from Thanksgiving through Christmas. Why? Everybody is arming themselves and I cannot figure out why. The ONLY explanation is that there is a Black man in the Presidency who has this deeply held, but heretofore hidden, desire to come after their guns.
Truly, we are a sick people. And, I really do mean that.
Mark
My congresswoman, Jackie Speier, was famously (like everybody knows that it happened, famous) shot in Jonestown, Guyana, essentially while trying to rescue constituents who had been taken away by Jim Jones’ cult.
I went to her health care town hall in 2009 and all these tea party douchebags in the crowd tried to shout her down and call her unpatriotic. They could have shouted at any other congressperson and maybe had a point, but they’re so stupid, they went after the only one who took goddamn bullets as a public servant.
Chris
@Citizen_X:
Speaking of fascist comments that aren’t hyperbole, one of the things I remember about that shooting is that soon afterwards, a few moderate Republicans in Arizona actually resigned due to skyrocketing death threats from far-right psychos out in the constituency.
In DC, all they do is gather and yell. In Arizona, they actively tip the state into rule through terror.
Elie
@efgoldman:
Yes, memories are short and advocating for gun control is particularly frustrating. I am arguing for a different advocacy — advocacy for improved mental health services and awareness. This is a lost frontier in health care and the absense of this awareness is the source of not only avoidable violence, but avoidable misery and despair for those who have mental conditions and their loved ones.
r€nato
One of the victims of the shootings was the subject of one of the Republic’s stories:
It must have taken all of his strength to hold himself back from saying, “I wish the bitch had died.”
r€nato
so… this guy was a teabagger… and it’s Mark Kelly’s fault that his wife is dead… because he didn’t have security there for Gabby… to protect her from death threats… which came from his teabagger comrades who were working with him to defeat Giffords.