Althouse: A friend "remembers occasionally going to watch a movie with [Adam] Lanza after a dance marathon and chatting with him about current events and chimpanzees."

November 25, 2013

A friend "remembers occasionally going to watch a movie with [Adam] Lanza after a dance marathon and chatting with him about current events and chimpanzees."

The inane/absurd search for meaning in the mind of a lost and now-hated soul.

11 comments:

mccullough said...: It seems similar to trying to figure out why some people do self-less heroic acts.; 11/25/13, 6:03 PM
Fritz said...: The sad fact is that normal people occasionally go crazy and do bad things.; 11/25/13, 6:22 PM
YoungHegelian said...: If I'm the parent & my child won't let me in his/her room, the child isn't going to get a gun for a present.

Sorry, guns & kids requires a better level of parental trust than that. I say that as someone who grew up in a household with four long guns in easy reach. If my brother or myself had EVER attempted to do something stupid & irresponsible (not necessarily threatening, just stupid), our father would have lowered the boom on us in no uncertain terms.; 11/25/13, 6:49 PM
Biff said...: Meanwhile, coincidentally (or not), the Yale campus was on SWAT lockdown involving, local, state, and federal law enforcement for most of the day in response to an anonymous call from a phone booth about a gunman headed towards campus. Police now suspect it was a hoax.

Agitprop lives.; 11/25/13, 6:56 PM
David said...: This is the report in which we learn that the police arrived at the building 63 seconds before the last shot was fired. The firing ceased for five minutes. Reasonably confident that the shooter had killed himself, the police then entered the building.

Someone had been firing for over 10 minutes in a primary school.

The police wait five minutes after arrival before going in.

When seconds count . . .; 11/25/13, 7:49 PM
David said...: I skimmed several of the articles about this report.

As far as I could tell, none gave a link to the actual report.

Either they don't understand the internet, or they understand it very well.; 11/25/13, 7:56 PM
David said...: I found a link in the USA Today article That lead me to the report, and this:

One staff member heard a loud crashing noise and ran toward the front lobby. As the staff member got closer, bullet holes could be seen and gun powder smelled. Realizing what was going on, the staff member immediately called 911, turned and went back down the hall from where the staff member had come. During the incident, while staying on the line with the 911 operator, this staff member sent other staff to their rooms or had them stay in their rooms and this staff member went about locking doors. The staff member remained in the hallway on the telephone with the 911 operator until the police arrived.

That is remarkable.

The staff member is not identified. Nor, at least as I recall, was this action featured in the press coverage.

Bravery, calm and modesty. Things to be thankful for.; 11/25/13, 8:09 PM
Wince said...: The first 911 call was received at 9:35:39 a.m. The first police officer arrived on the scene at 9:39:00. The last gunshot — believed to be the suicide shot — was heard at 9:40:03.

That's a much more compressed timeline than I previously understood.; 11/25/13, 9:33 PM
Anonymous said...: He may not have been legally responsible for his son, but God damn it, Lanza's millionaire father should have done something. He had ample resources to help.

Peter; 11/25/13, 10:04 PM
The Godfather said...: "Why did Adam Lanza, a troubled young man, kill his mother as she lay asleep in her bed, then shoot his way into his old Connecticut elementary school, where he gunned down 20 children and six adults before committing suicide?"

That's an easy question. He was crazy.

The important and difficult question is: What should be done to identify homicidal maniacs before they kill a lot of people? We don't seem to be doing a good job on that question.; 11/25/13, 10:18 PM
Robert Cook said...: "Meanwhile, coincidentally (or not), the Yale campus was on SWAT lockdown involving, local, state, and federal law enforcement for most of the day in response to an anonymous call from a phone booth about a gunman headed towards campus. Police now suspect it was a hoax.

"Agitprop lives."

Where's the "agitprop?" It's just some asshole playing a malicious prank.; 11/26/13, 7:02 AM