Okay, Yonuh, I'll stay away from anything or anyone mentioning Westboro.

This is indeed a very sad story, and I too was caught by the story of the nine year old girl who was shot - born on 9/11 and died in this tragedy. That is enough to make her a martyr or figurehead of some sort in our fight against violence.

My mother and step-father knew both Gabe and Gabby. My step-father was, until recently, sort of the "de-facto mayor" of "The Greens," a retirement community in Green Valley, AZ, and very active in local politics, serving on a number of committees focused on improving the area and dealing with the problems with illegal immigrants. (Green Valley is on a trail many illegal immigrants follow into the US.)

They had the highest regard for Gabby and her staff, and have been quite devastated by this news.

My mother told me last night that there were as many people in church on Sunday as there would normally be for a Christmas service. So clearly MOST of the people in that area are grieving as much as she is.

I believe this is going to become a watershed event in our history, just as happened with 9/11.

I would hope so, Anne, but am afraid that in a few weeks we'll be on to the next mass shooting at a school, a workplace, wherever. You know, we don't like to admit this, but unhinged people are everywhere.

I really hope that people of all stripes will tone down their rhetoric at the very least. At the very least, hateful, violent talk is no help. We shouldn't have to be mourning all these people to realize that, but that's the way we are.

Not that I can think of anyone who deserved this, but how ironic that someone should kill people who represented the best in us. Rep. Giffords was well respected as was the judge. One man died shielding his wife; how brave and sad is that?

And it always seems the [cream of the crop] go down. If Sarah
Palin gets into a high political office, I'd worry about her
safety. IMO men feel threatened by women in power. Don't know.
It's just the way it seems.

Jabber, it seems like the cream of the crop go down because they do. We see bad, broken people take out good people, but some of those bad, broken people were once good people broken down by worse people or by the system.

Yonuh, Westboro is in the news this afternoon. A committee has been formed in AZ to keep them away from the funerals and congress is writing a new legislation to the same effect.

The AZ legislature passed a new law, unanimously, making it a Class 1 misdemeanor (the most serious) to be within 300 feet of the property line of any place where a funeral or burial is taking place during, for one hour before, and one hour after. There is an 'angel shield' and a 'wall of humanity' ready to go into action, and all the motorcycle clubs in AZ and some neighboring states also plan to be there. Westboro's response has been to say they will shift their focus from the 9 year old's funeral on Thurs to the judge's funeral on Friday, but they will have the same response from us. They are not going to spoil the funerals of any of these victims. I am taking off work to go and make sure they don't!

Glad the AZ legislature could work so fast. I'm impressed.

And Yonuh, it is wonderful that people like you are willing to take time off from work to make sure those awful people aren't able to protest at the funerals.

Yeah, me too. I've never, ever, known them to work that fast! Now if they could just do that with some other stuff! (Well, I can dream, can't I?)

Wow, you're fast, woman! (I was editing my post to compliment you, Yonuh, while you were writing a reply!) Whew!