Photo Of The Day - Rep. Gabrielle Giffords

Staffers of Rep. Gabrielle Giffords today posted new photos of the congresswoman. Giffords continues to improve, but reportedly has difficulty forming complete sentences. She faces more cranial surgery.

Tucson Shooter Found Incompetent

Not very surprising.

Jared Loughner is incompetent to stand trial, a federal judge decided today. A psychologist and psychiatrist both found Loughner unable to help in his own defense or understand the proceedings. Doctors say he is schizophrenic. U.S. District Judge Larry A. Burns said doctors report Loughner is unable to help with his defense because of his irrational distrust of lawyers. He doesn't understand the system and the role played by everyone, doctors said in their reports. Loughner doesn't think he can get a fair trial because of conspiracy, the judge was told by doctors.

Stand by for calls for Loughner's execution anyway.

Baja Arizona

NPR reports on the secessionist movement to split Arizona into two states, with the relatively liberal bastion of Tuscon and its surrounding area to become Baja Arizona, the 51st state.

Baja Arizona supporters say there's a serious side to their quest to create a new state. They say Arizona is headed in the wrong direction — cutting education and health care funding and hurting the state's reputation and business climate with laws like SB 1070. And they say Republicans in the Legislature are punishing Pima County for its opposition. The Legislature tried to deny money to Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik because he doesn't support SB 1070. It passed a law trying to change the way Tucson holds city elections, and another bill dictating how the city can bid public works projects. Republican state Rep. John Kavanagh helped pass many of those laws. He says the Legislature is doing what it thinks is right. "We pass laws based upon what we believe the people of Arizona want," he says. Kavanagh says the effort to split the state is just Democratic sour grapes.

Like all secessionist movements, Baja Arizona doesn't have the remotest chance of becoming a reality. But it's interesting to see the good guys behind one of these campaigns. That's a switch.

Arizona Pastor: Gay People Want Your Children & Will Do Anything To Get Them

Pastor James White of Arizona's Alpha & Omega Ministries has posted a vicious response attacking Minnesota state Rep. Steve Simon, who last week asked "How many more gay people does God have to create before we accept that he wants them around?" White says that gay people will stop at nothing to get at the defenseless children of Christians. You'll have enough of his hate after just a few minutes on this lengthy clip.

Two Gay Dads, Twelve Adopted Kids

Go read this amazing story from the Arizona Republic.

Tony Perkins Defends Arizona's New Anti-Gay Adoption Regulations

But the good guy in Fox's debate does quite well.

ARIZONA: House Approves State Gun

Not to be outdone by Utah, who last month became the first state with an official gun, yesterday the GOP-dominated Arizona House voted to make the Colt revolver the state's official murder weapon. Talking Points Memo reports:

The Arizona House early Wednesday narrowly approved the Colt Single Action Army Revolver as the state's official gun. The bill had been rejected earlier in an all-night session, the AP reports, but it eventually won approval by a 32-25 vote. "Anytime you see a Western movie, the revolver in John Wayne's hand is a Colt single action," Arizona state Sen. Ron Gould (R) told Reuters. "This is a historic firearm and it fits well with the story of Arizona." But state Sen. Albert Hale (D) -- former president of the Navajo Nation -- said "the gun symbolized the extinction, the extermination of those Indians who were here."

ARIZONA: Teabagger Flag Granted Same Legal Protections As U.S. Flag

Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer has signed a bill granting the Tea Party flag the same legal protection as the American flag. Properly known as the Gadsden flag, homeowners associations are now barred by state law from banning its display.

Current law overrides any rules when it comes to the U.S. flag, the flags of any branch of the military, the state flag, the POW-MIA flag and the flag of any Indian nation. The new law will add the Gadsden flag to that protected list, that yellow flag with the drawing of a coiled rattlesnake and the phrase “Don’t Tread on Me.”

RELATED: My pal Dr. Jeff and I recently spotted the Tea Party flag flying from the upper windows of an Upper East Side megamillion dollar townhouse. Fight the power!

ARIZONA: Jan Brewer Vetoes Birther Bill, Approves Bill Restricting Gay Adoption

Today Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer drew the ire of fellow teabaggers when she vetoed a bill requiring presidential candidates to submit a birth certificate in order to be placed on the state ballot.

Brewer said in her veto letter that she was troubled that the bill empowered Arizona's secretary of state to judge the qualifications of all candidates when they file to run for office. "I do not support designating one person as the gatekeeper to the ballot for a candidate, which could lead to arbitrary or politically motivated decisions," said Brewer, who was secretary of state until she became governor in 2009. "In addition, I never imagined being presented with a bill that could require candidates for president of the greatest and most powerful nation on Earth to submit their 'early baptismal circumcision certificates' among other records to the Arizona secretary of state," she said. "This is a bridge too far."

Also today Brewer approved a bill requiring that married opposite-sex couples be given first preference in all adoption decisions. According to the bill's opponents, this may effectively mean the end of gay adoption in Arizona.

Senate Bill 1188, which was sponsored by Sen. Linda Gray, R-Glendale, would require an adoption agency to "give primary consideration to adoptive placement with a married man and woman." It permits the agency to consider a single person if, among other things, the child's best interests require the adoption by a single person or if a married couple is not available and the alternative is extended foster care. The bill applies to both state and private adoption agencies. Previously, only Utah has a law requiring priority for married couples, though several other states have bans on adoptions by same-sex couples or by unmarried couples.

ARIZONA: Birther Bill Passes

Arizona's GOP-dominated legislature has passed its bill requiring all presidential candidates to provide proof of being born in the United States in order to have their names placed on the ballot.

Lawmakers in 10 states introduced birther bills in their state legislatures at the beginning of this year's sessions, but the Arizona bill is so far the only one to make it to a governor's desk. The measure had failed twice in the last two years to make its way through the legislature, but this time was shepherded by a compliant Republican leadership that had not been eager to advance the issue before. The Republican speaker of the state House supported the bill this time, he told The Arizona Republic, because he believes it does not "add to or detract from the qualifications for president as stated in the United States Constitution." Brewer has not yet indicated where she stands on the bill, but has five days to choose whether to sign or veto it. If Brewer decides to not take a position and let the five-day period lapse, the bill will become law.

As you might expect, World Net Daily is doing ecstatic backflips and is directing readers to a website calling on Brewer to sign the bill.

ARIZONA: Teabaggers Introduce Bills Setting Up Interstate Pacts To Defy Feds

Tea Party-backed GOP lawmakers in Arizona have introduced bills that would create alliances with other states in order to defy the federal government. Ironically (or maybe not so, since we're talking about teabaggers), the federal government would have to approve the alliances.

The push to form interstate compacts, which have the power to supersede existing federal law if approved by Congress, is part of a broader effort at the Arizona Capitol to promote states' rights. Lawmakers have introduced bills that seek to limit congressional spending and federal authority on issues from elections to environmental inspections, and Gov. Jan Brewer lists federalism as one of her top priority initiatives this term. So far this session, Republican legislators have introduced more than a dozen bills that propose to create compacts, about three times as many as lawmakers introduced in each of the past two or three years. Among them are measures to allow participating states to build a border fence, regulate endangered species without federal interference and set up their own health-care programs.

The lawmakers behind the bills cite the Tenth Amendment, which stipulates that the federal government cannot issue laws on subjects not explicitly mentioned in the U.S. Constitution. And since the Constitution never mentions environmental protection, health insurance, etc...all those federal laws are therefore illegal.

Rep. Trent Franks (R-AZ) Calls For Obama's Impeachment Over DOMA

RELATED: Before he was a member of Congress, Franks was the founder of the Arizona Family Research Institute, an offshoot of Focus On The Family. He later chaired Arizonans For Common Sense (anti-abortion) and Arizonans For An Empowered Future (school vouchers). Shortly after the Giffords shooting, he can out against a ban in high-capacity gun clips.

ARIZONA: Illegal Gun Sales Continue

Gothamist notes: "One investigator was able to pay cash for a .9 mm semiautomatic even after telling the seller he probably wouldn't pass a background check. Instead of refusing the sale, as required by federal law, the gun peddler pockets the $500 and directs his shady customer toward the tent with the cheap ammunition."

Gay Hero Daniel Hernandez To Attend State Of The Union With Michelle Obama

Openly gay Arizona shooting hero Daniel Hernandez and his father will be seated with the First Lady at Tuesday's State Of The Union address.

"I'm both honored and excited to have the opportunity to travel to our nation's Capitol for a once in a lifetime event. Also the chance to bring my father along for his first trip to Washington, D.C. The State of the Union is a pivotal moment because it is our opportunity to find where we are and where we will be going as a nation in this upcoming year," Hernandez said.

Tuesday is also Hernandez' 21st birthday. That's quite a present.

AZ Rep. Trent Franks (R) Opposes Bill Banning High-Capacity Gun Clips

"People have tried to politicize this and make everything except the killer responsible." Guns don't kill people...etc etc.

ARIZONA: Teabaggers Demand Recall Of Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik

Pima County, Arizona's Sheriff Clarence Dupnik became a media sensation when he blamed Tea Party and GOP rhetoric for creating the violent atmosphere that may have led to the Tucson massacre. So rather than engage a bit of self-reflection, the teabaggers are calling for his head.

Sheriff Dupnik, who has occupied his post since 1980, won re-election most recently in 2008 with just under 65 percent of the vote. He won't face voters again until 2012. Perhaps. Fed-up constituents may not have to wait. Arizona is one of 18 states with a broadly worded recall law for public officials. Here's the key provision in the Arizona Constitution, Article VIII, Part 1: "Every public officer in the state of Arizona, holding an elective office, either by election or appointment, is subject to recall from such office by the qualified electors of the electoral district from which candidates are elected to such office." If petitioners in Pima County collect 25 percent of the number of votes cast in the last election (about 90,000 would be needed) they can put Sheriff Dupnik on the ballot in a special recall election. In October 2003, California's voters ousted Gov. Gray Davis in a recall election - a far tougher task.

The Tucson Tea Party's campaign against Dupnik predates the Giffords tragedy and first began when he refused to enforce Arizona's racist immigration law.

Sarah Palin Appears On Fox News To Respond To "Political Finger-Pointing"

Sarah Palin on Sean Hannity tonight: "In a situation like we have just faced in these last eight days of being falsely accused of being an accessory to murder, I and others need make sure that we too are shedding light on truth so a lie cannot continue to live. If a lie does live, then of course your career is over and your reputation is thrashed and you will be ineffective in what we intend to do."

Teabaggers Claim Obama Commanded Applause At Tucson Memorial

Over the weekend reichwing and widely-read Tea Party bloggers began claiming that the reason we heard so much applause at the memorial for Tucson's shooting victims is because audience members were "commanded" to do so by the arena's Jumbotron, which, of course, was secretly being run by the Obama administration. In fact, the Jumbotron operator was live-captioning the event for hearing-impaired members of the audience. Parenthetical notations like "(applause)" and "(music)" are always used when such moments occur. The bloggers in question know this, but continue their shameless campaign.

Tucson Shooting Victim Arrested For Saying "You're Dead" To Guns Advocate

One of the victims in last Saturday's shooting in Tucson was arrested today after saying, "You're dead," to a man advocating for gun ownership. The arrest of Eric Fuller, 63, came at a taping of ABC's Town Hall, which was being moderated by Christiane Amanpour.

Toward the end of the taping, Amanpour brought up the issues of gun safety and mental health. As one member of the audience stood up and expressed his support for gun ownership, Fuller, seated near the front in an area reserved for victims and special guests, appeared increasingly frustrated and agitated. Fuller then swiveled in his chair, raised his camera and took a photo of the pro-gun speaker, muttering, "You're dead," according to Joel Tranter, who was sitting behind him. "I told him, 'You need to be respectful. You need to calm down,'" Tranter said. "He said, 'What'd you do, vote for this guy?'" As police officers approached to escort Fuller outside, he turned and shouted at the audience: "You whores!" The rest of the taping continued without incident and wrapped up about five minutes later. Outside, Fuller was arrested for making threats, said Capt. Byron Gwaltney of the Pima County Sheriff's Department.

According to a local Tucson television station, Fuller's comments were directed at Tuscon Tea Party founder Trent Humphries, who garnered some poor press of his own on Thursday when he blamed Rep. Gabrielle Giffords for not carrying a firearm to prevent her own shooting.

Cops Find Photos Of AZ Shooter Posing With Gun While Wearing Red G-String

Investigators today said that they've received a bizarre series of photos of mass murderer Jared Lee Loughner. The photos show Loughner wearing a red g-string with a Glock pistol next to his naked buttocks.

The photos were turned over to the police by Walgreens, where Mr. Loughner had taken the 35-mm film to be developed on Jan. 7, the day before the shooting. In some of the photos he is holding the gun near his crotch, and in others, presumably shot in a mirror, he is holding the gun next to his buttocks, the police said. It was not yet clear when the photos were taken. According to a detailed timeline released by the Pima County Sherriff’s Department on Friday, Mr. Loughner posted one of the photos and a bulletin saying, “Goodbye friends,” on MySpace early Saturday morning.