12 13 people were killed in an Aurora, CO movie theater as a gunman shot at people during the premier of the latest Batman movie. Amateur video from the theater shows the scene as people ran for their lives to escape the theater. A suspect, 24 year old James Holmes, is being held by police.
From ABC News:
Witnesses in the movie theater said Holmes crashed into the auditorium through an emergency exit about 30 minutes into the film, set off a smoke bomb, and began shooting. Holmes stalked the aisles of the theater, shooting people at random, as panicked movie-watchers in the packed auditorium tried to escape, witnesses said.
Aurora is just minutes from Littleton, CO, the site of the Columbine High School shootings in 1999, where two students killed 12 students and one teacher.
The mother of the suspect, who lives in San Diego, heard of the news and immediately thought the worst:
She had awoken unaware of the news of the shooting and had not been contacted by authorities. She immediately expressed concern that her son may have been involved.
“You have the right person,” she said.
“I need to call the police,” she added. “I need to fly out to Colorado.”
While information is still being gathered, others have taken to standard operating procedure (see: craven political attacks) to make this political. Twitter and other social media is already pitting the blame on radio host Rush Limbaugh for comments he made about the new Batman film.
New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who has gained the ire of freedom activists nationwide for trying to control what people eat and drink, immediately went after the 2nd Amendment and gun ownership:
I mean, there’s so many murders with guns every day,” he continued. “It’s just gotta stop. And instead of these two people, President [Barack] Obama and Governor [Mitt] Romney talking in broad things about, they want to make the world a better place. OK. Tell us how. And this is a problem. No matter where you stand on the Second Amendment, no matter where you stand on guns, we have a right to hear from both of them, concretely, not just in generalities, specifically, what are they going to do about guns?”
UPDATE – Piers Morgan of CNN adds to the anti-gun rhetoric.
ABC News anchor Brian Ross attempted to tie in the Tea Party to the shooting, as a page on a local Tea Party website supposedly belongs to a James Holmes:
There is a Jim Holmes of Aurora, Colorado page on the Colorado Tea Party site as well. Talking about him joining the Tea Party last year. Now, we don’t know if this the same Jim Holmes.
Breitbart.com has found that it is a different James Holmes, and not the suspect in the shooting.
At APM, we abhor these disgusting attacks by news organizations and political leaders who have so little information, and consistently desire to eliminate citizen’s rights under the guise of safety. Our thoughts and prayers are with the victims and their families.
