Massacre at children's bowling league

[BlueWaveNeverEnd]

One bowler, who only identified himself by his first name Brandon, said he heard 10 shots ring out before he ran down the alley barefoot and climbed inside the bowling machinery to hide from the gunman.

'I thought it was a balloon, I had my back turned to the door. And as soon as I turned and saw it was not a balloon, he was holding a weapon, I just booked it down the lane and I slid basically in where the pins are and climbed on the machine.

Brandon, who stayed on top of the machines for about ten minutes until the cops arrived, said that the gunman was around 15ft behind him. 'He was close, very close,' he added.

'I just went there to bowl by myself and I wasn't even in there 10 minutes, I just walked in the place. I was putting on my bowling shoes when it started. I've been barefoot for five hours.'

Riley Dumont said her 11-year-old daughter was playing in the children's bowling league when she heard several gunshots. She told ABC News her father, a retired police officer, rushed the family into a corner.

'I was laying on top of my daughter,' Dumont said, adding that her own mother lay on both of them to protect them. At least seven people were killed in the first shooting.

Jason J. Levesque told CNN that the youngest victims of the shootings were teenagers, adding that trauma specialists and grief counselors were at the scene.

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12674801/I-hid-bowling-lane-escape-Maine-rampage-gunman-Survivor-tells-firearms-instructor-mental-health-issues-opened-fire-killing-22-wounding-60-including-teenagers-going-run.html

[ProfessorGAC]

1. EIGHTY PLUS Casualties In One Shooting

22 dead!
And we still have millions who think the answer is more guns.

[malaise]

2. Expect lots of thoughts and prayers

This is absolute madness

[BlueWaveNeverEnd]

6. I think that only the Las Vegas shooter shot more people.

[markodochartaigh]

11. Pulse Nightclub

49 murdered, while the police waited outside, 53 more injured

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orlando_nightclub_shooting

[onenote]

23. Apparently the numbers have been updated:18 dead, 13 wounded. Still horrific.

Wouldn't be surprised if those numbers continue to be revised, probably upward.

[bucolic_frolic]

3. Republicans will be emotionally unmoved by this shooting, as will SCOTUS majority

600 mass shootings this year. No one can do anything about it. Because 2A!! The primary amendment for Republicans.

[Conjuay]

4. The only amendment

That matters.

To them.

[Smooth155]

8. Republicans are 100% at fault for this

The republicans across this country are at fault for every mass shooting in this country especially with a AK 47 there the ones who passed these laws that anyone can carry a damn weapon without any background checks

[Captain Zero]

18. Republican Voters and Politicians

Both are responsible.

[inthewind21]

24. Huh

Just them? What about all the people who didn't vote at all or voted 3rd party? Do they bear any responsibility?

[twodogsbarking]

5. But first the news from Israel.

[IronLionZion]

7. It's not terrorism when it's a mentally ill white guy with no political agenda

that's the price of freedom

On a related note, American gunners love reminding us how off duty IDF soldiers have to carry their military rifles everywhere. Israel has tons of good guys/gals with guns yet the Hamas attack still happened.

[onecaliberal]

27. He does have a political agenda. He's a MAGAT.

[IronLionZion]

28. He was a MAGAt RWer but not sure if that was the motive for shooting

I saw news reports that had made shooting threats before and was committed to a mental health facility earlier this year for hearing voices in his head. People in his community knew he was dangerous and to stay away from him. He was obsessed with guns, gun laws, mass shootings, etc.

Hmm... that describes a lot of MAGA. I'm all in favor of profiling MAGA gun nuts and restricting their access to assault rifles.

https://www.newsweek.com/robert-card-maine-mass-shooting-social-media-posts-1838068

[onecaliberal]

29. If he was in a mental health facility, he should NEVER have been allowed to have guns. These fucking white psychos do

not have the right to kill us with their war weapons.

[IronLionZion]

31. Unfortunately Maine has very loose gun laws and no red flag law

[onecaliberal]

32. California has tight gun laws the psycho court is undoing.

Laws don’t matter to these people.

[CincyDem]

9. To bad there wasn't a good bowler with a gun - I'm sure that would be made the difference.

Just in case I need it. I’m sure any discussion or questions today about limiting unfettered access to these kinds of killing machines will be met with cries of “too soon…too soon” from the single issue 2A supporters.

How many kids will be enough?

[SouthernDem4ever]

10. Mentally ill or not you're a fucking coward if you

walk into a place and gun down innocent unarmed people.

[sanatanadharma]

12. Every single gun-apologist, 2nd amendment defender is ...

Every single gun-apologist, 2nd amendment defender is ethically culpable. Period!
Having a gun is not the problem. Wanting the gun is because desire is the root of all action, good and bad.

Defending un-infringed gun ownership as the better moral choice in America today is a selfish, morality-malignancy.
The gun is a metastasized malignant-tumor in the human soul and gun defenders are the cause of the cancer, or at least for denying life saving measures in the USA.

So shoot your best absolutist apologia for the status quo, I care not. People with guns kill people. Other tools can be used but this latest 2nd amendment celebration demonstrates that the gun wielder is the problem and the wielding of guns MUST BE STOPPED!

[wils3038]

13. Teacher

I’m a veteran public high school teacher (41 years) in a red state. People always ask me how children have changed. Recently I have never seen so much bad behavior - cheating, disrespect, fighting, etc.… as we are dealing with today. Our school nurse told me that her cabinet used to be full of ADHD medicine, but now it’s full of depression and anxiety medicine. I honestly believe it is all about role models. For four years we had a greedy criminal as a president, who raped women, and bragged about it, who lied every day, who stole, cheated, and mocked the handicapped while discriminating against minority groups. The children I teach now were in elementary and junior high school at a very impressionable age when he was president, and I think it’s going to take a long time to recover.

[BigOleDummy]

15. Very good points

Along my thinking too actually.

Welcome to DU

[mainer]

14. Maine is a heavily armed, open carry state.

Yet this happened. So where was the good guy with a gun? Clearly it doesn't matter if you have an armed populace when a guy with an AR walks in.

[Kaleva]

16. I'd run, even if armed, if someone with an AR-15 walks in

and starts shooting

[IronLionZion]

17. That's happened with many mass shootings even with police on the scene

good guys with guns don't want to be shot either.

[WalkerinSC]

20. A handgun versus a rifle

Unless you are in close quarters the rifle wins that fight 9 out of 10 times. Better range, more power (typically), better precision in a stressful hostile environment and more capacity. I have many semi autos myself, including Ruger's version of the AR-15, Bushmaster .308, Ruger Mini 14 (chambered .44 Mag) I use as a bush gun for coyotes and hogs and a small 10mm Carbine Survival gun for camping and hiking off the grid. As a responsible gun owner, I am conflicted over the best course of action. If an AR-15 was banned and I received fair market value for the Ruger AR and Bushmaster, I probably wouldn't lose much sleep or freak out about a tyrannical government overreach. I would probably balk at a full semi auto ban. There aren't any easy answers, and I am not sure where the Left and Right can meet in the middle for any solution. The idea I have given before of graduated ownership depending on training (Bolt, single shot, breech load at age 16 with basic safety course through school followed by lever action, pump, 18 with advanced safety course, and semi auto and handguns at 21 with further safety classes and registration of those models at the county level with 5 year sentences possession, 25 year commission of crime, and 25 to life for loss of life) usually gets booed down by both sides. That's my attempt at a solution. I am open to others.

[Wednesdays]

21. The big difference is

you aren't mentally ill.

[inthewind21]

22. Why

Has "he's mentally ill" become the go to for every bad deed committed by a white male? Is it possible to just be a bad guy and not be mentally ill? Are terrorists mentally ill? Or are they just evil?

[WalkerinSC]

26. I think sometimes

'Mentally ill' is used because the rational mind cannot comprehend what it sees. One of my failings, which I freely admit to, is a lack of any form of empathy except for very young children and the mentally challenged or those suffering from dementia since they can't be held culpable for their actions. I have a difficult time understanding how people hurt children. Unless the guy was hearing voices and driven by some unseen mental defect, I can see him as nothing more than a piece of evil flotsam that needs to be removed from society permanently (but not death penalty. He may be Un rehabilitative but taking a life doesn't solve anything). It maybe time to revisit asylums. They were not nice places decades ago, but surely we have moved to a point in 40-50 years that we can safely and compassionately treat and/or house those who are a danger to themselves and others.

[David__77]

19. The "left" would need to promote gun ownership to increase likelihood of restricting it.

The CA/Black Panther events are instructive in that regard.

[moondust]

25. Ordained by God, Mike?

Many people are saying...

[pwb]

30. Grief counselors and plenty of first responders but

very little Prevention eh?