Virginia Tech Shooting

Obviously my heart goes to the victims and their friends and families of this sick and twisted incident. After watching some preliminary coverage on CNN, I watched as the president and chief of police at Virginia Tech were interviewed, deflecting and barraged by questions from every direction. I cringed when I started hearing the monday morning quarterback-types accusing the campus police of being anything but competent. It's amazing how reporters think they would have led the initial investigation and decision-making AFTER the initial cloud is cleared.

Then we are just getting started with the "If I were there, I would have..." line of reasoning. Only those who looked death in the face need to comment on what they would have done. I listened as some radio programs began immediately blaming the anti-gun lobby for not having enough concealed weapons on college campuses. If I had not been to college in the last 10 years I may have forgotten, but there were way too many knuckleheads on campus that I would be too frightened to be on campus knowing many of them were packing. Let's get more guns on the streets and that is likely to reduce gun violence. Wow. Even a moron would know better.

"Why was there not a campus emergency action plan?" or "Why wasnt there a lockdown on campus after the first event?" Yes, that is realistic when dealing with 27,000 or so independant individuals on a campus that covers many acres and contains many buildings. Real possible to cover. Most people don't immediately think after a crime happens in one building that the next logical step is to lockdown the entire campus (we arent dealing with an elementery school here folks). Anyone who does think so, is either entirely clairvoyant or has great hind sight.

What I can't stand is that there is a pot shot from every angle, from every political side before the smoke has even cleared about this incident on every outlet from CNN to local news and radio. The fact we live in an open society, where we aren't at "lockdown" at all times is exactly why this thing can and will happen again. So yes, I can believe that it happened and as we lament the loss of innocent life taken, let us not turn this issue into anything more than a lunatic on a killing spree. We can take as many conspiracy theories as we want, but in the end who cares what he was listening to when it was the victims that we should remember.