Recently resigned Arizona Congressperson Gabby Giffords delivered the opening statement at today’s Senate gun hearings. Nothing I could write could add to the import of this clip. I can’t imagine a more profound argument against the rank evil of Wayne LaPierre and the NRA gun lobby.

Quentin Tarantino is being honored at Santa Barbara Film Festival this evening. If and when he takes questions, I will ask the following: “If you were presented with a Lars Von Trier-styled filmmaking exercise in which you had to write a film that didn’t use flip, cynical, grindhouse-style, cartoon-panel violence in movies — no handguns, machine guns, samurai swords, grenades or violence of any kind, either naturalistic or ‘in quotes’ — what would your movie be about? What would you come up with? Or would you just throw up your hands?”