Months after attack, Gabrielle Giffords now knows who died in shooting rampage
Posted in Main Blog (All Posts) on August 21st, 2011 4:35 am by HL
Months after attack, Gabrielle Giffords now knows who died in shooting rampage
PHOENIX — For months after the spasm of violence that shattered her world, Arizona congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords was shielded from the wider scope of that January morning, when a gunman shot her in the head, badly wounding her and 12 others outside a Tucson political event.
Trying to protect her fragile state, staff and family members didn’t let her know that six had perished in the Jan. 8 attack, including one of her most trusted staff members and a federal judge who was a close friend.
Just weeks ago, Giffords found out the truth, delaying a grief process the rest of the country had gone through months before.
Crimes against volunteers vex Peace Corps
A Peace Corps volunteer had been raped in Bolivia and wanted justice. Within hours, Julie De Mello was on an airplane from Washington to meet the victim.
De Mello, employed by the Peace Corps inspector general as a senior federal agent investigating crimes against volunteers, worked with the 23-year-old victim, Erin Bingham, to sketch the attacker. De Mello went with Bingham to a police lineup, hired a lawyer to represent her and worked with local police to track down witnesses.
De Mello believes her advocacy helped convict the rapist in 2008. He was sentenced to 10 years in prison.
Huntsman gets more aggressive with opponents, Obama
Jon M. Huntsman Jr. is finally making good on his pledge to be more aggressive with his opponents, saying in a recent interview that he “wouldn’t necessarily trust” any of his opponents when it comes to the handling of the economy.
Huntsman, who sat down for his first Sunday show interview as a presidential candidate with ABC’s Jake Tapper, had harsh words for President Obama as well, saying that he lacked leadership and direction in the fight over the debt ceiling.
“I have to say that there was zero leadership on display in terms of my opponents .?.?. zero leadership on display in terms of the president, who should have used the bully pulpit well ahead of time. He should have walked away from the teleprompter. The people want you to speak from your heart and soul. Tell us where you want us to go. Tell us what you expect from Congress. Tell us what’s on your mind. That never happened,” he said in the interview, which airs on “This Week With Christiane Amanpour.” “And it waited until the eleventh hour and then we had some of my Republican opponents who basically, I think, recommended something that would have been catastrophic for this economy.”
Perry criticizes government while Texas job growth benefits from it
LONGVIEW, Tex. — Texas Gov. Rick Perry has leapfrogged to the top tier of Republican presidential candidates largely on the strength of one compelling fact: During more than a decade as governor, his state created more than 1 million jobs, while the nation as a whole lost 1.4 million jobs.
Perry says the “Texas miracle” rests on conservative pillars that he would bring to the White House: minimal regulation and government, low taxes and a determination to limit the reach of Uncle Sam.
What he does not say is that much of that job growth has come because of government, not in spite of it.
On the home front, reminders of the wars in Afghanistan, Iraq come in small doses
The wars came to the Nationals baseball game, as they always do, in the third inning.
The wounded troops from Walter Reed Army Medical Center had assembled in the stands behind home plate. Those in wheelchairs were in front. The ambulatory stood behind them. The Nationals pitcher threw a strike for the third out.
“Give a warm welcome to brave servicemen and women and their families joining us tonight,” the stadium announcer intoned. Now the troops were on the big screen in center field, and the modest Tuesday night crowd was standing, hooting and cheering.
