Arizona shooting suspect charged with murder

President Obama led the one-minute silence in Washington as the United States came to a temporary halt to remember those who died during the assassination attempt on Democratic Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords.

At a briefing in the Oval Office later, the President said that the nation was grieving.

“I think it is important for us to also focus though on the extraordinary courage that was shown during the course of these events,” he added.

“The 20-year-old college student who ran into the line of fire to rescue his boss; the wounded woman who helped secure the ammunition that might have caused even more damage; and the citizens who wrestled down the gunman.

“Part of what I think that speaks to is the best of America, even in the face of such mindless violence.”

The road to Tucson

On my way to Tucson Arizona my first stop inside the US is Dallas Fort Worth airport, writes Channel 4 News Washington Correspondent Sarah Smith.

Very close to the scene of America’s most infamous political assassination, when President John F Kennedy was shot in downtown Dallas in 1963. People here are eager to tell me how shocked they are about the shooting of Gabrielle Giffords. Even the customs agent and immigration officials want to talk about how awful it was. And one even told me he was ashamed to be American if things like that could happen in his country.

Already there is debate about whether the extremely aggressive political atmosphere in America for the last couple of years has created a culture of violence. Whether the overheated rhetoric turned the temperature up past simmering and tipped it into incendiary.

The woman who helped stop the gunman speaks to Channel 4 News.

I just got an email from the left wing group MoveOn.org asking people to sign a petition demanding: “We must put an end to rhetoric of violence and hate that has exploded in America over the last two years”. But even that is likely to inflame tensions further.

Gun support

When the local sheriff in Pima Country gave a press conference talking about “the anger the hatred and the bigotry in this country”, he provoked an angry response from the right who are furious that they are apparently being blamed for the actions of one individual whose motivations are far from clear and who has been described as mentally unstable.

You don’t get elected to Congress to represent the state of Arizona if you want to take peoples guns away. And she supported legal gun ownership.

Sarah Palin has long enjoyed annoying liberals with her love of guns. Proudly telling anyone who will listen that she had her last baby shower in a shooting range. Gabrielle Giffords herself would have supported Palin’s right to do that. You don’t get elected to Congress to represent the state of Arizona if you want to take peoples guns away. And she supported legal gun ownership.

But she also warned that Palin and her supporters that they had gone too far when they issued a map prior to November’s mid -term elections which had gun sights marked over the Democratic seats the Tea Party were targeting. Gifford said at the time “we are on Sarah Palin’s targeted list.”

“The way that she has it depicted has the crosshairs of the gun sight over our district. When people do that they have to realize there a consequences to that action.”

Intimidation attacks

Giffords knew what she was talking about because already her office had been vandalized after she voted in favour of healthcare reform. But even she could not possibly have foreseen a terrible attack like the one she fell victim to.

During all the political rallies and protests I have covered in the US I have never felt unsafe or worried that things were about to turn violent. Even when Tea Party supporters started bringing guns to rallies. The kind of violent scenes we saw during recent student protests in London have never happened in America during my time here. In fact Americans are rather fascinated by our habit of occasionally rioting in the streets. They still show old footage of the poll tax riots in Trafalgar Square on TV, using it to advertise the new series of Law and Order UK.

Obviously there is very tight security surrounding the US president. And more around Obama than any of his predecessors. It’s pretty amazing to watch the secret service in action wherever he goes. But it’s remarkably easy to get near other senior American politicians.

Anyone can simply walk into the Congress and Senate buildings and approach their elected representatives.

Suspect Jared Loughner, 22, has been charged with murder and the attempted assassination of congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords. She was shot along with 19 other people - six of whom died - in Arizona on Saturday. Giffords remains in a critical condition in hospital after being shot in the head at the public meeting in Tucson. Two government officials and a nine-year-old girl are along those killed.

Accessible politics

Quite often we do this with our camera to ask them questions. And every time we put all our TV equipment through the pretty rudimentary screening procedures I am surprised that security seems lax compared to the House of Commons. But that is deliberate, not negligent.

There is a very strong commitment to open government in America. They think it is essential to their democracy that they are easily able to access politicians. And it’s this commitment that led Gabrielle Giffords to be standing outside a Safeway store asking people to come and speak to her.

The relationship between electors and the elected may have been fundamentally changed in America.

There will be much debate to come about what provoked the attack on Giffords and what its consequences will be for American politics. Politicians from all sides are already agreeing that it must not prevent them from being able to speak freely to their voters any where or anytime.

But that relationship between electors and the elected may have been fundamentally changed in America. While commentators are asking whether this appalling attack will be the event that brings political discourse back from the brink – or whether we are about to witness a series of attacks like those in the late 1960s, the last time vitriolic political arguments turned tragically violent.