Sarah Palin will not appear at the opening day of her defamation case against the New York Times.

Courtesy of the New York Daily News: 

Conservative activist Sarah Palin won’t be attending the first court proceeding in her defamation case against The New York Times, according to her lawyer. 

The former vice presidential candidate and Alaska governor filed a lawsuit on June 27 alleging The Times ran a “fabricated story.” The initial conference in the case is set for 11 a.m. Friday. 

Asked Thursday whether Palin will be in the courtroom, her lawyer, S. Preston Ricardo, replied “No” in an email to the Daily News.

"Conservative activist?" Well I guess that sounds better than "failed reality show performer," or "political has been."

I love this part of the article: 

Palin wants The Times to pay up for “falsely stating to millions of people that she, a devoted wife, mother and grandmother, who committed a substantial portion of her adult life to public service, is part of a pattern of ‘lethal’ politics,” the suit contends.

"Devoted" wife, mother, and grandmother? 

If the court will indulge me I'd like to make an objection. Or vomit in my mouth, whichever is the more convenient.

And who is she kidding with this "committed a substantial portion of her adult life to public service?"

The only public that Palin ever served was her the public that looked back at her from a mirror every morning.

Remember this case is only seeking $75,000 in damages.

And since the Times has declared they are planning to aggressively fight this thing Palin could end up with hundreds of thousands of dollars in legal fees.

Gabrielle Giffords and husband Mark Kelly, confront Jared Loughner at sentencing.

Here is the statement read by Mark Kelly in its entirety courtesy of the Huffington Post:  

Mr. Loughner, for the first and last time, you are going to hear directly from Gabby and me about what you took away on January 8th, 2011 and, just as important, what you did not. So pay attention. 

That bright and chilly Saturday morning, you killed six innocent people. Daughters and sons. Mothers and fathers. Grandparents and friends. They were devoted to their families, their communities, their places of worship. 

Gabby would trade her own life to bring back any one of those you savagely murdered on that day. Especially young Christina-Taylor Green, whose high-minded ideas about service and democracy deserved a full life committed to advancing them. Especially 30-year old Gabe Zimmerman, whom Gabby knew well and cherished, and whose love for his family and his fiancee and service to his country were as deep as his loss is tragic. Especially Judge John Roll, whom Gabby was honored to call a colleague and friend and from whose interminable dedication to our community and country she gained enormous inspiration. Gabby would give anything to take away the grief you visited upon the Morrises, the Schnecks, and the Stoddards – anything to heal the bodies and psyches of your other victims. 

And then there is what you took from Gabby. Her life has been forever changed. Plans she had for our family and her career have been immeasurably altered. Every day is a continuous struggle to do those things she was once so very good at. Gabby is a people person: she exudes kindness, creativity, and compassion. If she were not born with the name – “Gabby” – someone would have given it to her. Now she struggles to deliver each and every sentence. Her gift for language can now only be seen in Internet videos from a more innocent time. 

Gabby was an outdoor enthusiast. She was often seen rollerblading with her friend Raoul in Reed Park, hiking in Sabino Canyon, or careening down Rillito Wash Trail on her bike, as she was the night before you tried and failed to murder her. She hasn't been to any of those places since, and I don't know when she’ll return. 

There’s more. Gabby struggles to walk. Her right arm is paralyzed. She is partially blind. Gabby works harder in one minute of an hour – fighting to make each individual moment count for something – than most of us work in an entire day. 

Mr. Loughner, by making death and producing tragedy, you sought to extinguish the beauty of life. To diminish potential. To strain love. And to cancel ideas. You tried to create for all of us a world as dark
 and evil as your own.

 But know this, and remember it always: You failed. 

Jared Loughner pleads guilty to 19 counts in exchange for avoiding the death penalty. Sadly many of his victims were themselves unable to avoid such a fate.

Courtesy of CNN:

Jared Lee Loughner, the alleged gunman in last year's mass shooting outside an Arizona supermarket in Tucson that killed six persons and wounded then-U.S. Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, pleaded guilty Tuesday to 19 charges in exchange for the government not seeking the death penalty. 

Loughner faces multiple life sentences in prison under the plea deal, and he also waived his right to pursue an insanity defense. 

"My name is Jared Lee Loughner," the defendant told the court when he held up his right hand under oath. Loughner calmly told the court he understood his guilty plea. "Yes, that is correct," he said. 

"I'm 23 years old," he told the court. "I attended college for five years at a community college." 

Earlier Tuesday, Judge Larry Alan Burns found Loughner competent to stand trial in a federal court in Tucson. 

Giffords' husband, Mark Kelly, said in a statement Tuesday that he and his wife are satisfied with the agreement. 

"The pain and loss caused by the events of January 8, 2011 are incalculable," Kelly said. "Avoiding a trial will allow us -- and we hope the whole Southern Arizona community -- to continue with our recovery and move forward with our lives." 

Loughner was facing the possibility of a death sentence if convicted.

Well I think it is a good thing that the survivors are not forced to relive that day.  And personally I don't think the death penalty is necessary in this case since I am pretty sure that Loughner is mentally ill.

Of course now that we come to the close of this terrible incident we have two fresh ones to remind us that there are just too many guns readily available to individuals who have no business having access to such weapons of destruction.

But then again, who really does deserve to have such access? Who really needs to have a weapon whose sole purpose is to end a human life at the tips of their fingers?

In my opinion very, very few people.

Today is the first anniversary of a day that will forever live in infamy.

To this day nobody knows what Jared Loughner cites as the reason for his shooting spree.

But we do know who put those crosshairs over Gabby Giffords district, and who was the MOST responsible for the violent rhetoric that we were hearing leading up to that terrible day.

Don't we?

Arizona Republicans to raffle off same model of handgun used in the attempted assassination of Gabrielle Giffords!

From Raw Story:

The Republican Party in Arizona's Pima County, which is represented by Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ), is in the midst of a fundraising raffle, $10 per entry. 

The prize: the same model of gun that delivered a near-fatal blast to the Democratic lawmaker's skull outside a Tucson grocery store in January. Tucson is in Pima County. 

The local party sent out its e-newsletter late last week advertising the raffle. On the third page of the seven-page document, a large illustration of the gun appears with the headline "Help Pima GOP get out the vote and maybe help yourself to a new Glock .40." 

The winner of the gun will also receive a case, three 12-round magazines and grips for the firearm. "Tickets will go quickly for this firearm!" the blurb in the newsletter warns. 

The $1,250 raised from the raffle tickets will go toward get out the vote efforts for the party. 

The gun is a Glock 23, an updated model of the Glock 19 Jared Loughner used during his January 8, 2011 shooting spree that killed six and injured 13 others, including Giffords

Oh my God! What the fuck is wrong with these people?

How can ANYBODY, even Republicans, be this completely insensitive and hateful?

I'm sorry, but I am literally so pissed off by this that I am shaking and can't even type any more.

Jared Loughner deemed mentally unfit to stand trial.

From the LA Times:

A federal judge ruled Jared Lee Loughner mentally incompetent to stand trial in the Jan. 8 shooting spree that gravely wounded an Arizona congresswoman after two medical experts agreed he suffered from schizophrenia and for several years has been troubled by delusions and hallucinations.

Judge Larry A. Burns sent Loughner back to the federal medical center for prisoners in Springfield, Mo., for treatment and further evaluation, stopping for now any attempt to take him to trial for the shooting that killed six people and injured 12 others at Rep. Gabrielle Giffords' neighborhood meeting.

Without any change in his condition, Loughner could spend the rest of his life in federal mental health facilities. But if he shows some signs of improvement, his case could go forward.

The ruling came after U.S. marshals removed Loughner from the courtroom Wednesday when he suddenly started screaming. His father, Randy Loughner, sat in the second row next to Loughner's mother and cried almost the entire time.

Court staff variously reported him saying "thank you for the free kill" or "free shot," and then, "she died in front of me," and "you're treasonous." A government source said Loughner is convinced he killed Giffords, and that "she died in front of me" apparently refers to that belief.

When asked later whether he could behave in court, Loughner told Burns that he would prefer to watch the proceedings on a closed-circuit television screen in a courtroom anteroom, where he remained for the rest of the hearing.

Too mentally unstable to sit in a court room, but NOT too mentally unstable to buy a Glock with an extended clip in Arizona. 

How can ANYBODY read that and NOT believe that we need much, much, much stricter gun control laws in this country?

In my opinion after the brutality that took place in Arizona we should immediately impose MUCH stricter gun control laws throughout the country. But if nothing else, we can do something about this.

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By the way there is a Newsweek article now available about Gabby Giffords recovery.  Here is a little tease for you:

One of Giffords’s Democratic House colleagues, Rep. Shelley Berkley of Nevada, visited Giffords in Houston and emerged to say that she was eager to return to the House. “She’s raising money now,” Berkley told a Las Vegas television reporter. “She’s running a campaign from the hospital.”

Federal prosecutors announce new charges against Jared Lee Loughner.

From the Chicago Sun Times:

Federal prosecutors on Friday announced new charges against the suspect in the attempted assassination of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, accusing him of killing six people and wounding 13 others who were exercising the fundamental American “right to meet freely, openly and peaceably with their member of Congress.”

U.S. Attorney Dennis Burke called the 49-count indictment returned Thursday against Jared Lee Loughner “comprehensive and is solid, and covers all the murdered and injured victims” who were at the political event held by Giffords outside a Tucson grocery store.

“There are no distinctions at all between the victims,” Burke said, adding that they “were exercising one of the most precious and fundamental rights of American citizens.”

The indictment charged Loughner in the murders of U.S. District Judge John Roll and Giffords aide Gabe Zimmerman. Four other people who were not federal workers also died in the Jan. 8 attack, including a 9-year-old girl, and 13 others were wounded.

He also was charged with causing the death of a participant at a federally provided activity; injuring a participant at a federally provided activity; and using a gun in a crime of violence, stemming from the wounding of 10 people who didn’t work for the federal government.

It is easy to forget, with all of the publicity surrounding Gabby Giffords, that there were actually nineteen victims of Loughner's shooting spree, and that six of them lost their lives that day.

I will be interested to learn exactly what set this damaged individual on a course of mayhem and destruction.  We have discussed the possibilities, including possibly hate speech and anti-government rhetoric, but we really do not yet have a definitive answer.

Personally I would like one, even though it will never be a compelling enough reason to explain how somebody could do what he did that terrible day in January.