Gabrielle Giffords Attends First Gun Show Since Shooting

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Photo Credit: AP/Tim RoskeA smiling Gabrielle Giffords toured rows of tables loaded with rifles and handguns in her first visit to a gun show since surviving a 2011 shooting, and pleaded afterward for people to come together to stop gun violence.

The former Arizona congresswoman visited the Saratoga Springs Arms Fair on Sunday with her astronaut husband, Mark Kelly and New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman to highlight a voluntary agreement that closely monitors gun show sales in New York.

The trio mixed with a gun show crowd that was mostly welcoming — with a few hostile undertones — before calling for people to build on the cooperative effort.

“We must never stop fighting,” Giffords said at a post-tour news conference, her fist in the air. “Fight! Fight! Fight! Be bold! Be courageous!”

Giffords, a face of the national gun control effort, slowly walked hand-in-hand with Kelly through the large room where Winchester rifles, muzzle-loaders, antique knives and other weapons were on display and “Don’t Tread on Me” flags hung from poles.

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Feds Removed Handles From 40 Public Water Pumps Along C&O Canal

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Photo Credit: APNational Park Service (NPS) rangers removed the handles from some 40 public water pumps and closed restrooms in the 184.5 mile- C&O Canal National Historical Park, but they haven’t been able to keep hikers and bikers off the popular trail known as a “cyclist’s dream.”

“It’s full every day,” said Gail Hall, who runs Mountain Side Bikes at the trailhead in Cumberland, Md. “They’re bringing in their own water and utilizing the tree-lined areas [of the park] for restrooms. Some towns like Harper’s Ferry even brought in potties to accommodate them. As long as they can pedal, they don’t care.”

Cumberland Times-News reporter Matthew Bieniek, who first reported that the handles on the park’s old-fashioned water pumps had been removed as part of the federal government shutdown, told CNSNews.com that Park Superintendent Kevin Brandt told him that the pumps had been disabled “to discourage people from attempting to use the park.”

But Michael Nardolilli, president of the non-profit C&O Canal Historical National Park Trust, which runs interpretive programs at the park’s historic lockhouses, later said that the pump handles were removed for “public health reasons.”

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Protesters Chain Themselves to Stop Deportations in Arizona

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Photo Credit: notonemoredeportation .comImmigrant-rights protesters have chained themselves in front of an detention facility in Eloy, Ariz., and planned to blockade the main federal immigration office in Phoenix later Monday, hoping to stop anyone from being deported.

The moves are the latest act of civil disobedience from activists who are demanding the Obama administration halt all deportations. Among the protesters were illegal immigrants.

“Undocumented — unafraid,” the protesters chanted as they blocked the road at the facility Monday morning, which is southeast of Phoenix and is one of the busiest detention locations in the country.

The protesters aired their action in a webcast.

While activists have demanded action from Republicans in Congress, they are increasingly critical of President Obama over his record of deportations. Under his watch, immigration authorities have set records by deporting about 400,000 immigrants a year.

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Cruz, Lee, Palin Speak at WWII Memorial – Protestors Tear Down Barricades (+video)

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A crowd converged on the World War II Memorial on the National Mall, pushing through barriers Sunday morning to protest the memorial’s closing under the government shutdown.

Republican Sen. Mike Lee of Utah and Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas were among those who gathered Sunday morning, along with former Alaska governor Sarah Palin, according to WTOP radio. Cruz said President Obama is using veterans as pawns in the shutdown.

“Tear down these walls,” the crowd chanted. Protesters also sang God Bless America and other patriotic songs as they entered the memorial plaza.

The memorial has become a political symbol in the bitter fight between Democrats and Republicans over who is at fault since the shutdown began. Earlier rallies have focused on allowing access for World War II veterans visiting from across the country with the Honor Flight Network.

Sunday’s rally was more political. A protest by truckers converged with a rally by a group called the Million Vet March at the World War II Memorial. Participants cut the links between metal barriers at the National Park Service site and pushed them aside.

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No Evidence Dems Can Take Back House

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Photo Credit: DonkeyHoteyThe 2010 midterm election that swept Republicans into power in the U.S. House of Representatives was a mandate to put the brakes on President Obama and his agenda.

Aside from voters also hoping that Republicans would do something – anything – to boost the economy, restraining Obama was pretty much the issue of that election.

It was the second wave election in four years (Republicans were dumped from the majority in 2006). And it had less to do with voters finding Republicans appealing once again and more to do with putting a halt to the Democrats’ overreach.

At the center of that overreach was the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare – which is why many of those elected to office in that cycle and reelected last year have been adamant about repealing it, even at the cost of a government shutdown.

Or even at the cost of losing their seats, which has led to talk of a Democrat wave election cycle. It is a possibility pushed by paid pundits as reality, but the facts do not support it.

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Rand Paul: Dems Treating Government Shutdown as ‘a Parlor Game’ (+video)

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Photo Credit: Reuters On Sunday’s broadcast of CNN’s “State of the Union,” Kentucky Republican Sen. Rand Paul slammed Democrats for trying to score political points by making the partial government shutdown as painful as possible.

Paul told host Candy Crowley the hit the Republican Party is taking is exaggerated and said that ultimately both sides will held accountable.

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Video: ‘Barrycades’ Torn Down, Dumped at White House

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Photo Credit: WNDThousands of Americans have taken the government shutdown into their own hands, literally, as they stormed into the nation’s capital, tearing down barricades blocking off the World War II Memorial on the National Mall Sunday morning.

“Barrycades are down,” tweeted Sherry Lucas, a reference to President Barack Obama’s childhood nickname of Barry.

Many of the barricades were then hand-carried by the protesters and dumped in front of the White House.

This weekend has seen the convergence of U.S. veterans and truckers on the nation’s capital, as many protest the closure of public memorials as well as the president’s policies.

Sens. Mike Lee, R-Utah, and Ted Cruz, R-Texas, addressed the crowd at 9:30 a.m. and were later joined by former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin.

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IMF Chief: U.S. Dance with the Debt Limit is ‘Very, Very Concerning’

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Photo Credit: AP/Alex BrandonBy Tom Howell Jr.

The chief of the International Monetary Fund says the U.S. government’s stalemate over spending and its debt limit is “very, very concerning” and could roll back economic progress around the world.

Christine Lagarde, who took over the financial watchdog-and-rescue organization in 2011, said global finance ministers assembled for meetings in Washington last week feeling like Japan had finally turned the corner and that economies in the U.S. and Europe were on the upswing.

“And then they found out that the debt ceiling was the issue,” she said Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press.” “They found out that the government had shut down and that there was no remedy in sight. So it really completely transformed the meeting in the last few days.”

Ms. Lagarde, a lawyer from France, added a global perspective to the standoff that has roiled Washington for weeks and befuddled overseas investors who typically view the U.S. as a paragon of financial rectitude.

Instead, Senate leaders are trying to forge a deal that would extend the federal debt limit and end a government shutdown about to enter its third week.

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Budget Talks at Impasse; Democrats Won’t Agree on Spending Cuts

By The Associated Press.

Senate Republicans and Democrats hit an impasse Sunday over spending in their last-ditch struggle to avoid an economy-jarring default in just four days and end a partial government shutdown that enters its third week.

After inconclusive talks between President Barack Obama and House Republicans, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., took charge in trying to end the crises although no resolution seemed imminent.

“Americans want Congress to compromise,” Reid said at the start of a rare Sunday session in the Senate in which he pressed for a long-term budget deal.

The two cagy negotiators are at loggerheads over Democratic demands to undo or change the automatic, across-the-board spending cuts to domestic and defense programs that the GOP see as crucial to reducing the nation’s deficit.

McConnell insisted that a solution was readily available in the proposal from a bipartisan group of 12 senators, led by Sens. Susan Collins, R-Maine, and Joe Manchin, D-W.Va., that would re-open the government and fund it at current levels for six month while raising the debt limit through Jan. 31.

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Across the Country, Donors Chip in to Help Programs Hurt by Federal Government Shutdown

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Photo Credit: L. Allen BrewerAs the partial government shutdown rolls on, programs that rely on federal money are feeling the strain — and so are the people who depend on their services.

For 16-year-old Alishe’ah Sockwell, federal money makes a big difference.

It helps put a roof over her head. It allows her mother, Nia, to undergo job training. And it pays for childcare for Sockwell’s young daughter so that Sockwell can go to high school every day in Little Rock, Ark.

But with some federal funds out of reach because of the shutdown, Sockwell may have to stay home from school in order to watch her daughter. If the shutdown drags on much longer, her housing could be in jeopardy, too.

So, to fill in the gaps, the nonprofit organization that provides Sockwell and other homeless people in Little Rock with childcare, shelter and other assistance, has asked community members to chip in.

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N.J. Gov. Christie Flips, Says He Now Wants In-State Tuition for Illegal Immigrants

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Photo Credit: Mel EvansImmigrant-rights activists say New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie reversed himself Saturday and endorsed giving illegal immigrants in-state college tuition rates, and said he will try to get the issue through his legislature in a lame-duck session.

Mr. Christie, who is up for re-election in November, is also seen as eyeing a bid for the GOP’s 2016 presidential nomination — but his support for in-state tuition could complicate that.

“We need tuition equality for everyone in New Jersey,” the activists said the governor said in a speech to the Latino Leadership Alliance of New Jersey.

Afterward, the activists said, Mr. Christie told one of them that, “We will get it done in the lame duck.”

A message left with Mr. Christie’s office Sunday morning wasn’t returned.

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