Giffords shooting

[stillrobertpaulsen]

Just wanted to ask if anyone knows if it has been verified how Judge John Roll found out that Congresswoman Giffords was holding her event at the Safeway near his church. I've tried searching for a source that his wife said he received a call telling him to go there, but have yet to find it. So what kind of coincidence was this?

Not answering my own question yet, but looking into Judge Roll, I found out a bizarre fact: he changed his middle name!

During the funeral, Roll's older brother, Ed, recalled how the family had moved to Arizona from Pittsburgh because their mother was in poor health. She eventually died when Roll was 15. Ed Roll told mourners Roll changed his middle name from Paul to his Irish mother's maiden name, McCarthy, "to keep that part of the family alive."

http://www.tampabay.com/incoming/judge- ... an/1145684

He changed his middle name from Paul to McCarthy. Too weird!

[8bitagent]

Latest news said Giffords is able to scroll through an ipad and a number of other things, including standing up with assistance. Someone earlier said it was unlikely she'd be in a physical or mental position to ever be in politics again, but I don't know..at this trajectory she's on I guess anything is possible. It'll be curious to see how this story evolves along with the 'final NASA shuttle mission' story

If he was ignored by the media then .. can you see the strange loop. To me its clear JLL knew the fuss he'd cause, and it seems to me that he thought this was the only way he could make some real meaning out of his life.

Dunno how mental illness fits with all that, but everyone is crazy to some extent, and all mental illnesses are better viewed as a spectrum which everyone is fits into. We're all prone to our brain chemistry going a bit funny, some are more prone than others tho, but thats it. No one is immune to some mental conditions if their life goes pear shaped enough.

Just the fact he called himself "Jared Lee Loughner" and left little breadcrumb trails meant he knew what he was doing and wanted. And sure enough, in the public arena hissingular insignificant life managed to bring the entire country and the President to focus on him and his act; bringing himself and this event to the cover of countless magazines and newspapers. It's quite a feat really. Had this been just another office or school shooting, it would have been off the radar by lunch news the next day.

[nathan28]

So you take a psychotic grown kid and have him listen to Fox News every day, because he lives at home with his parents in Arizona. His father is reported to have been unemployed for years and yet somehow has a lot of money. And the kid keeps his black bag-o-ammo in the trunk of the family car.

I was under the impression that there is an actual diagnosis of schizophrenia, but my understanding is that it's a sort of narcissicism or delusions of granduer or reference coupled with reinforcing hallucinations, i.e., trouble both at the levels of cognition and perception. Regardless, I think this is pretty much what's going on. It speaks to the ridiculousness of the mouthbreathing retardofascist authoritarian hacktitude that is teabagging (i.e., Stalinism with a free market face) that Giffords, a conservative Democrat whose lead supporters are aerospace cos., i.e. military contractors, that Palin & Friends would literally target this woman. I do tend to think that she might have been selected through a sort of background noise power of suggestion thing, which is where I'd think any misogyny would come in. Etc.

[WakeUpAndLive]

Just the fact he called himself "Jared Lee Loughner" and left little breadcrumb trails meant he knew what he was doing and wanted. And sure enough, in the public arena hissingular insignificant life managed to bring the entire country and the President to focus on him and his act; bringing himself and this event to the cover of countless magazines and newspapers. It's quite a feat really. Had this been just another office or school shooting, it would have been off the radar by lunch news the next day.

I never understood this notion...its not like he'll get to wake up sunday morning, stroll outside and see his photo plastered on the Daily News. He is in custody, beyond the glimpses he may see on TV or the occasional newpaper siting he doesn't even get to see 90% of the extent his act caused. There has to be more to it.

[barracuda]

Latest news said Giffords is able to scroll through an ipad and a number of other things, including standing up with assistance. Someone earlier said it was unlikely she'd be in a physical or mental position to ever be in politics again, but I don't know..at this trajectory she's on I guess anything is possible. It'll be curious to see how this story evolves along with the 'final NASA shuttle mission' story

That was me voicing doubt on the extent of her recovery. And though I don't have any hard evidence, I haven't changed my opinion due to the fact that she has apparently shown the ability to stand with assistance and scroll an iPad, capabilities which are available to any one-year old.

My feeling at the moment is that Giffords "stunning recovery" is being parlayed for all it's worth as a propaganda tool, and is largely limited to wishful thinking. As I recall, last week we were told that once the ventilator breathing tube was taken out and replaced by the tracheotomy, she'd be in a better position to demonstrate speech. Well now they've done that, and subsequently moved the goalposts, saying the tracheotomy is preventing her from speaking:

She will continue to receive intense physical and speech therapy at TIRR Memorial Hermann, with a team led by Dr. John Holcomb, a retired Army colonel.

Kelly told reporters Thursday he believes his wife has tried to speak, although she is prevented from doing so by a breathing tube in her neck, and believes she is aware of her surroundings, saying he can look in her eyes and tell.

She will smile at him and pat him on the face -- something she did before the shooting and that she usually only does when he is around, he said.

She also had a fairly significant operation to her right orbital on Saturday:

The operation involved opening a window in Giffords' skull through an incision over her eyebrow, removing the rim of her eye socket, removing the bone fragments and then reconstructing the socket with the help of metal mesh, doctors said. She will need another skull repair surgery, but that will be done later.

And regarding the "neck rub" her husband claims to have received from her:

Asked about a report that Giffords gave her husband, Mark Kelly, a neck rub, Lemole said, "there's a lot of inference there" but said "it does imply that she's recognizing him." Doctors do not know whether she can see out of both eyes, he said, as that is pending a detailed examination.

There's a lot of inference there.

Clearly everyone wants her to come out of this in one piece and as close to her previous faculties as possible. However, I'm reminded of the Bob Woodruff case, in which he was also used for propaganda purposes and then largely shuttled out of the spotlight. Giffords will be used the same way, but her injury is far more serious. Only the members of the House can remove her from office, so expect the drama to be doled out for all it's worth upon the arrival of each tiny success in her recovery, if those successes occur at all. There are certainly no guarantees here.

[8bitagent]

@WakeUpAndLive: Well, I guess it'd be kind of like that scene in The Dark Knight where the Joker is just sitting there, hands folded in a jail holding cell...pleased as punch with himself. He didn't need to see headlines. Though, unlike the Bush connected Hinckley, he has zero chance of ever getting out.

@Barracuda: I agree with you, I think I meant to say it almost now feels part of the narrative in the media for her to recover and be hoisted up politically in the coming years.

However, even if she does recover basic functions...I too read about her surgeries and upcoming surgeries, and what the bullet did. My goodness, it's just horrific. Having to live with half of a fake skull, and so many steel pins and who knows what else. It's a terrible, terrible fate. Gunshots to the head are meant to kill, especially in the shooters mind...so when someone survives, it's never pretty(I had nightmares ofr awhile after seeing an Oprah special about this woman whose face was literally shot off by an abusive husband)

I mentioned the other day as we were watching the eulogy, how I am glad Giffords appeared to be on a path to some sort of recovery...but I was wondering how come victims in Iraq, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Gaza and Lebanon by US/allied/Israeli attacks dont receive near that kind of care or Obama's sympathy. To this day I feel very upset and sickened by that 2007 footage leaked by Wikileaks last year of US gunships
blowing up reporters, families and children and then laughing and gloating about it. How people arent in the streets of DC protesting every day is beyond me, and I am envious of some of the people on here who were around during the late 60's to have witnessed a true liberal/leftist spirit.

[justdrew]

Just wanted to ask if anyone knows if it has been verified how Judge John Roll found out that Congresswoman Giffords was holding her event at the Safeway near his church. I've tried searching for a source that his wife said he received a call telling him to go there, but have yet to find it. So what kind of coincidence was this?

there's a quote of that and a link to the source in this thread, early pages, maybe 3-6
His wife said he got the call "an hour before" - so I've always kinda wondered who made that call... someone with Gifford's team, or JLL (or a JLL helper)?

the story has morphed a bit and I think there's three versions of the event out now... with a call the day before, way earlier in the morning and the original story of the hour-before call.

and yeah, the video is out. was wondering if that would ever be released. kinda surprised it has been, seems like there should be third part cell phone derived aftermath video too at some point, but I can honestly see no one video-ing in this kinda situation. Not watching the video myself, I'm just not into seeing that kinda thing absent some specific reason to.

---

I can't help but think of this movie...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Regarding_Henry
(which I had completely confused with What About Bob from the same year)

[JackRiddler]

I never understood this notion...its not like he'll get to wake up sunday morning, stroll outside and see his photo plastered on the Daily News. He is in custody, beyond the glimpses he may see on TV or the occasional newpaper siting he doesn't even get to see 90% of the extent his act caused. There has to be more to it.

Yes and no. Nowadays everyone in our society has seen the treatment these cases get, many times, for decades. Name any mass murder scenario, and you will be able to say with fair precision in advance how much splash it would make and how long the coverage would run. So in custody or not, he has a good idea of how "big" his act is playing. Assuming that's a major motive to him, and that appears to be the case.

Here's an essay I wrote on this theme the day after the Virginia Tech massacre:

The Murder-Entertainment Complex
NBC as an element in the production of mass murderers

April 21, 2007

In the first "Scream" flick, the teenagers who are about to be hunted down and killed one by one talk about whether the horror movies they love to watch create serial killers. No, one of them answers: Horror movies just make the killers smarter.

The mass media do not create human timebombs, at least not by any direct mechanism; but they do give them ideas. No doubt some people are born with a high predilection for fits of psychotic, murderous rage, a drive to kill beyond the violent urges shared by all humans (at any rate by almost all men). No doubt such tendencies develop or are inhibited through environmental factors: upbringing, childhood abuse, trauma, the stations of one's experience.

What the culture-at-large certainly affects is how a timebomb personality is likely to blow. As a violent psychosis arises, its carrier might do nothing until he crashes a car, jumps off a bridge, or lashes out suddenly and fatally within familiar surroundings, at people close to him. He might sign up with the military, or become a mercenary. Sociopaths with a measure of self-control and good social skills have been known to make careers in politics and organized crime. (Am I being redundant?)

Why is it that in recent decades, in the United States and elsewhere, so many timebomb personalities have exploded specifically into mass-murder rampages of the type exemplified by Columbine and now Virginia Tech? The easy availability of guns only explains the choice of weapon and the often-high number of casualties.

I submit that the corporate mass media have played a lucrative and immoral role in a cultural chain of production that helps create mass murderers of this type. I submit that while the corporate mass media did not originally choose this role, they became fully conscious of it long ago. They have developed an industry of mass-murder consumption worth billions of dollars a year. This industry spectacularizes the perpetrators in direct proportion to the number of victims killed and the degree to which the original act created live drama. (A group of Amish girls in a one-room school is not as impressive as 32 college-age victims in two locations several hours apart, is it? So you don't even remember the name of the Amish school-girl murderer, who committed his crime just a few months ago, whereas Cho will be with us for many years.)

In the case of real-life killers, this celebration of their exploits is camouflaged by the exploitation of grief, rituals of moral approbation, and "the public's right to know." But the fictional treatments generally do without need of piety or pomposity: The most prolific and profitable Hollywood genre stars mass-murderers. Some of them are supernatural, some of them shadows pursued by a heroic cop. More movies are made about them than about all scientists and Mother Teresas and athletes combined. Manson and Ted Bundy and Son of Sam are brand-names alongside their fictional, supernatural counterparts, Freddy and Jason and Hannibal Lecter. (Yes, this is just as much a commentary on the market as on the media who serve it.)

On receiving the package from Cho (or "Ismail Ax," his supervillain identity), NBC could have taken one picture, broadcast it at low resolution, and described the other contents of the package factually. That would have fulfilled the requirements of "delivering the news." They could have devoted a few minutes to the package as the second or third story of their program. They could have kept a copy of the material to protect themselves, and left the rest to the cops.

Instead, NBC gave the Cho package full coverage as top-plus story. They showed the text of his "manifesto" so that anyone taping it could read it, released all of the stills and broadcast much of the video. They used Cho's choice of imagery as icons to sell their program. And every single other corporate media outlet followed suit. Today, the front page of every tabloid in New York features the same shot of Cho with two guns, and I'm sure that's true in almost every other US city and town.

The broadcast of the material amounts to a glorification. Yes, they call him "evil," which is exactly what he wanted. The lonely, frustrated psychotic is now a comic-book character, a myth, an immortal. He's joined the killers' pantheon alongside his inspirations, Dylan and Eric, whose celebrity requires no last name. Reality once again meets the standard of satire, for this is exactly like the scene in "Natural Born Killers" when the imprisoned Woody Harrelson discusses with Robert Downey the impact of his media persona, compared to that of other famous mass murderers.

In the next stage, a movie will be developed, perhaps to be described as a courageous look into the extremities of the human soul that speaks to the universal struggle that plays out in all of us between good and evil, or some such bullshit. It's not out of the question that calls have already been exchanged among producers, first timetables plotted; less than two years would be "too soon," but a movie can take that long to develop.

Without a doubt, this cultural reception of murder encourages future timebombs to choose the same path, as Cho himself predicts in his own bloody-minded images and words. This is obvious to everyone with minimal sense. No talk on NBC's part about how they agonized over the decision to broadcast this material can mitigate the reality. We all know they viewed the decision as inevitable, and gave themselves some time so they'd feel like they'd treated it with sufficient gravity.

At least the tabloids don't bother with the bogus moral justifications.

Here's a little mental exercise: Imagine Cho had killed 33 people meeting in a corporate boardroom, or the cabinet of a head of state, or a group of generals discussing next year's biowarfare and nuclear weapons acquisitions. Imagine this happened far away from any TV cameras, but then NBC received a package from the killer. Imagine the accompanying manifesto had a comprehensible political basis, however vile it may have been.

On receiving such a package, what would NBC do? I submit they would never dare to broadcast it, even though it would actually be relevant, it would undeniably constitute "news." To broadcast it, however, would reward and encourage the murder of power-brokers, of owners, of elites. Furthermore, in this imaginary case, no one would be wondering whether the act qualified as terrorism, as they do with the Cho murders. It would be the first word in the broadcasts: "A terrorist attack..."

Because Cho killed students and teachers at random, it is safe for NBC and the corporate media to publicize the material he provided, immediately. His victims are expendable. They are an acceptable and fully externalized cost in the chain of production for the murder-entertainment complex. NBC and all the corporate media companies who followed its lead are free to maximize their Cho windfall. And for the mass murderers of the future, they are providing the how-to, the fashion tips, the incentive: the glory.

---

[Avalon]

Just wanted to ask if anyone knows if it has been verified how Judge John Roll found out that Congresswoman Giffords was holding her event at the Safeway near his church. I've tried searching for a source that his wife said he received a call telling him to go there, but have yet to find it. So what kind of coincidence was this?

Not answering my own question yet, but looking into Judge Roll, I found out a bizarre fact: he changed his middle name!

During the funeral, Roll's older brother, Ed, recalled how the family had moved to Arizona from Pittsburgh because their mother was in poor health. She eventually died when Roll was 15. Ed Roll told mourners Roll changed his middle name from Paul to his Irish mother's maiden name, McCarthy, "to keep that part of the family alive."

http://www.tampabay.com/incoming/judge- ... an/1145684

He changed his middle name from Paul to McCarthy. Too weird!

Sorry, you've lost me.

Are you thinking from Paul to McCartney? (Which he didn't). Or is there some other significance?

[undead]

So you take a psychotic grown kid and have him listen to Fox News every day, because he lives at home with his parents in Arizona. His father is reported to have been unemployed for years and yet somehow has a lot of money. And the kid keeps his black bag-o-ammo in the trunk of the family car.

I was under the impression that there is an actual diagnosis of schizophrenia, but my understanding is that it's a sort of narcissicism or delusions of granduer or reference coupled with reinforcing hallucinations, i.e., trouble both at the levels of cognition and perception. Regardless, I think this is pretty much what's going on. It speaks to the ridiculousness of the mouthbreathing retardofascist authoritarian hacktitude that is teabagging (i.e., Stalinism with a free market face) that Giffords, a conservative Democrat whose lead supporters are aerospace cos., i.e. military contractors, that Palin & Friends would literally target this woman. I do tend to think that she might have been selected through a sort of background noise power of suggestion thing, which is where I'd think any misogyny would come in. Etc.

He was never diagnosed or even evaluated, the schizophrenia diagnosis came from the media. I think that one very significant thing about Giffords that led to her getting shot was that she identified herself as a "former Republican". If you don't think that the Tea Party had something to do with this, then it was certainly very convenient for them.

[Joe Hillshoist]

Just wanted to ask if anyone knows if it has been verified how Judge John Roll found out that Congresswoman Giffords was holding her event at the Safeway near his church. I've tried searching for a source that his wife said he received a call telling him to go there, but have yet to find it. So what kind of coincidence was this?

Not answering my own question yet, but looking into Judge Roll, I found out a bizarre fact: he changed his middle name!

During the funeral, Roll's older brother, Ed, recalled how the family had moved to Arizona from Pittsburgh because their mother was in poor health. She eventually died when Roll was 15. Ed Roll told mourners Roll changed his middle name from Paul to his Irish mother's maiden name, McCarthy, "to keep that part of the family alive."

http://www.tampabay.com/incoming/judge- ... an/1145684

He changed his middle name from Paul to McCarthy. Too weird!

I'll say. I honestly thought he was called McCarthy cos he was from a conservative family.

[nathan28]

She will continue to receive intense physical and speech therapy at TIRR Memorial Hermann, with a team led by Dr. John Holcomb, a retired Army colonel.

Kelly told reporters Thursday he believes his wife has tried to speak, although she is prevented from doing so by a breathing tube in her neck, and believes she is aware of her surroundings, saying he can look in her eyes and tell.

She will smile at him and pat him on the face -- something she did before the shooting and that she usually only does when he is around, he said.

...

Clearly everyone wants her to come out of this in one piece and as close to her previous faculties as possible. However, I'm reminded of the Bob Woodruff case, in which he was also used for propaganda purposes and then largely shuttled out of the spotlight. Giffords will be used the same way, but her injury is far more serious. Only the members of the House can remove her from office, so expect the drama to be doled out for all it's worth upon the arrival of each tiny success in her recovery, if those successes occur at all. There are certainly no guarantees here.

If anything I'd expect Giffords will be the source of a lot of OT hours for the staff at the rehab clinic. I'm reminded of the Christopher Reeve "very limited but surprising" rehab, which including hours and hours a day of stimulation ranging from massage to electrotherapy to using a harness to allow him to "stand" etc. Reeve did begin to regain sensation in his legs before dying, though it took years and thousands of hours.

Of course, the difference there is that Reeve's neurological problems were at the spine, not the brain. But Giffords has a pretty severe brain injury, but the brain has a lot of redundancy. Alcoholics make strong recoveries, but their neuroimages show regions of the brain active that someone with less chemical trauma wouldn't be using. This is part of "neuroplasticity". Alcohol isn't an acute trauma like a 9mm slug, and not even that toxic, and that toxicity can largely be avoided by just eating your freaking vegetables.

Throughout this chapter we avoid such phrases as "recovery after head injury," There is a reason for this. Most people's experience, and therefore expectations, regarding illness and injury is one of temporary reduction in functioning, followed by a gradual return to normalcy. People get sick, go to hospital, and get better. Bones are broken, casts applied for a period, muscle strength regained over several months, and scars fade.
When commonplace notion of recovery is applied to head injury, however, considerable harm can be done. Almost never does a patient "recover;" the residual deficits are usually significant and permanent. The continual expectation of recovery can lead clients and families into denial, frustration, disappointment, and even worse, extremely unrealistic expectations and planning.

http://www.getrealresults.com/tenmyths.html

Acute injuries really do shut down certain functions, and the compensation might not be in the same faculty. IIRC people who are blinded tend to develop better hearing and touch, and have stronger "cognitive mapping" (e.g., the ability to walk around in a familiar environment in the dark) of their surroundings. Aphasics, which like Woodruff, Giffords will probably be, are better at recognizing dishonesty than people without speech issues--but they still have trouble talking. As something of sidenote, journalists having practically made misquoting a profession, so 'helping' Woodruff talk, and presumably 'helping' Giffords talk, isn't a far cry.

"Who finished the last of the bagel?"
"Bagel?"
"BAGEL. Hot. Brown. Liquid. Bagel."

Which is to say that Giffords probably won't be making any unassisted appearances in Congress and that a lot of middlebrow crap will appear on TV about this.

But, of course, the purveyors of bullshit will use Giffords shamelessly to promote their degenerate agenda. If you want to see the misogyny directed at a professional woman, it'll be forthcoming in the form of a 21st century Horatio Alger story. Expect conservative stooge Malcolm Gladwell to publish another bestseller, this time some vulgar ideological drivel about the Magical Science!!! of our remarkable brains and how it's impossible for people to display any intentionality so PR actually helps us think better anyway, therefore, guns don't cause brain injuries that cause bad decisions, but not being a member of Obama's coterie of advisors does, so trust us, citizen.

But I for one look to Giffords being made a soap opera figure in Our National Story, soon to appear as the sole topic of retrospective magazines in supermarket checkout aisles, and trotted out with full camera attention to boldly cast votes in the Great War on Everything, showing us that It Takes a Village to Pull Yourself Up By Your Own Bootstraps and still achieve Success Despite All Odds while the United States descends into a farce, literally propping up brain dead leaders (see also Ronald Reagan) in a way that even the Chinese Communist Party would be ashamed of.


So in a way, even though Jared Lee Loughner is a loser, his confreres win in the end. The way he murdered others as part of some ethic motivated by pure aesthetics, Giffords's soon-to-appear (with wall-to-wall coverage followed by complete silence) "recovery" will be another case of art trumping reality.

[Joe Hillshoist]

Dunno how mental illness fits with all that

I think the part where he walked up to a total stranger and shot them in the face, then started shooting everyone around him. I think that's how the mental illness fit in.

I'm one of the most empathetic and sympathetic people you'd probably ever run into in real life, but to start ascribing any kind of "normal" stress to this guy takes me over the red line. I've also suffered huge amounts of stress and psychological torment from my own financial and career situation the last two years, and I never took a gun and shot somebody in the face.

You know what I mean?

This guy was FUBAR. His brain was FUBAR.

And trying to put blame on societal pressures, as tempting as that might be, just doesn't feel right to me, it feels dishonest. The guy was seriously FUBAR and would have been FUBAR under probably any circumstances.

People are like bottles of homemade beer in the cellar. Some of them just blow up.

I'm sympathetic to him insofar as his mind is gone, that's always godawful and tragic, but, no matter what happened to him, this guy's a dangerous motherfucker and can't ever be released into society again.

Well obviously he went ballistic and shot a load of strangers. By definition there is something wrong there, some fucked up loss or lack of perpective, which is one thing I've noticed in the people diagnosed with severe mental illness that I know of.

My only point is that people seem to do this in America all the time.

Obviously thats deeper than blaming Sarah fucking Palin or Glen Beck or JLLs pot smoking like some rightard trollumnist in the australian media did today.

[stillrobertpaulsen]

Just wanted to ask if anyone knows if it has been verified how Judge John Roll found out that Congresswoman Giffords was holding her event at the Safeway near his church. I've tried searching for a source that his wife said he received a call telling him to go there, but have yet to find it. So what kind of coincidence was this?

Not answering my own question yet, but looking into Judge Roll, I found out a bizarre fact: he changed his middle name!

During the funeral, Roll's older brother, Ed, recalled how the family had moved to Arizona from Pittsburgh because their mother was in poor health. She eventually died when Roll was 15. Ed Roll told mourners Roll changed his middle name from Paul to his Irish mother's maiden name, McCarthy, "to keep that part of the family alive."

http://www.tampabay.com/incoming/judge- ... an/1145684

He changed his middle name from Paul to McCarthy. Too weird!

Sorry, you've lost me.

Are you thinking from Paul to McCartney? (Which he didn't). Or is there some other significance?

Yeah. The weirdness I'm referring to is the Pontypoolish rhyme. "Now, Collette, that sounds like culotte, that's panty in French". Not sure about the significance other than, now that's weird!

[beeline]

Rep. Giffords leaves Tucson for rehab in Houston

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20110121/ap_on_he_me/us_congresswoman_shot

By SUSAN MONTOYA BRYAN and MARILYNN MARCHIONE, Associated Press Susan Montoya Bryan And Marilynn Marchione, Associated Press – 18 mins ago
TUCSON, Ariz. – Rep. Gabrielle Giffords left a Tucson hospital Friday and is being flown to a Houston rehabilitation center for her next steps in her recovery, less than two weeks after the congresswoman was shot in the head.

Well-wishers holding flags and signs that read "Get well Gabby" lined the ambulance's route between the hospital and Davis-Monthan Air Force Base, where Giffords was loaded on a specially outfitted jet.

"We want to be here to help her and show her a good farewell, and hope that she has a great recovery," said Al Garcia, a Marine veteran who came on his Harley Davidson motorcycle. "It's through all of these prayers that she's leaving in just two weeks."

A gunman shot Giffords and 18 other people Jan. 8 as she met with constituents outside a grocery store in Tucson. Six people died; all other survivors have been released from the hospital. The suspect in the attack, Jared Loughner, 22, of Tucson, is being held in federal custody.

Giffords has been making progress nearly every day at University Medical Center in Tucson. Her husband, Houston-based astronaut Mark Kelly, tweeted Friday: "GG going to next phase of her recover today. Very grateful to the docs and nurses at UMC, Tucson PD, Sheriffs Dept....Back in Tucson ASAP!"

Kelly is with Giffords on the plane, along with her mother, a doctor and other medical workers. A helicopter will take her from the Houston airport to the ICU at Texas Medical Center, where she'll be evaluated before going to the center's rehabilitation hospital, TIRR Memorial Hermann. U.S. Capitol police arrived Thursday afternoon to set up extra security measures at the 119-bed facility.

Doctors ticked off other markers of her improvement: She scrolled through an iPad, picked out different colored objects and moved her lips. They are unsure whether she is mouthing words, nor do they know how much she is able to see.

"Not everyone always gets 100 percent restoration, but we help them to get to a new normal," said Carl Josehart, chief executive of the rehab hospital that will be the Arizona congresswoman's home for the next month or two.

Dr. Gerard Francisco, the hospital's chief medical officer, will coordinate her care.

"It's going to be a very big team that will address different impairments, but they will have to work together," he said.

First, they'll check her vital signs — make sure her blood pressure and heart rate are good. Then specialists ranging from physical and occupational therapists to speech therapists and psychologists will give a slew of tests to see what she can and cannot do.

The strength of her legs and her ability to stand and walk. The strength of her arms, and whether she can brush her teeth or comb her hair. Whether she can safely swallow on her own. How well she thinks and communicates — not just her ability to speak but also to understand and comprehend, Francisco said.

It's unclear if she is able to speak. And while she is moving both arms and legs, it's uncertain how much strength she has on her right side; the bullet passed through the left side of her brain, which controls the right side of the body.

Giffords will stay at Memorial Hermann until she no longer needs 24-hour medical care — the average is one to two months. Then she can continue getting up to five hours a day of physical and other rehab therapies on an outpatient basis, Josehart said.

"It's hard to speculate on the trajectory or course that any one patient will have," he said.

Despite the steady progress, Giffords has a long road to recovery. Doctors are not sure what, if any, disability she will have.

Sometimes, areas of the brain that seem damaged can recover, said Mark Sherer, a neuropsychologist at the rehab center.

"Some of the tissue is temporarily dysfunctional, so the patient appears very impaired very early on after the injury," but may not be permanently damaged, he said.

Kelly said Giffords would be proud of the way Tucson has responded. Memorials continued to grow Friday outside the hospital, in front of her office and at the scene of the shooting.

"I know one of the first things Gabby is going to want to do as soon as she's able to is start writing thank you notes," he said.

___

Medical Writer Marilynn Marchione and Ramit Plushnick-Masti reported from Houston. AP aerospace writer Marcia Dunn contributed to this story from Cape Canaveral, Fla.

___