In this most recent chapter of the saga of senseless violence, 32 students and faculty perished on 16 April 2007. The perp was a—stop me if you’ve heard this before—disaffected loner, who harbored much resentment, and blamed others for his supposed misfortune.
While there has been a flood of media coverage, and countless would-be sages have weighed in on this incident, allow me a few thoughts…
Bearing in mind that details are still sketchy—perhaps on purpose—the biggest administrative mistake was to treat the earlier dorm killings as some sort of isolated incident. I’m really trying to understand this mindset. Two homicides occur on campus. The offender is at large, and it is just business as usual?
Forget about the prospect of a follow-up mass killing spree. What about the possibility of a shoot-out in the middle of the campus? How difficult would it have been to temporarily close the campus, and bar entrance and exit, if for no other reason than to aid in capturing the perp of the dorm murders? And think about this: The homicides occur at around 7 AM in a busy college dorm. Exactly how does Mr. Cho effect his escape from this building? Are we expected to believe that in the ensuing interviews, which would have occurred before the second shooting, that no one saw anything suspicious, or could even provide a description?
What happened here? Were the kids in the dorm that detached, or were they hiding in fear, behind locked doors? Did no one even peer out a window to observe someone who must have been nervously looking about as he made good his exit? Is anyone else concerned about this first crime scene with hundreds of potential witnesses, that came to naught?
Then there’s the theme of abdication of responsibility, and this does not only mean the perp, who blamed others in his notorious video. At the very least, Virginia Tech president Charles W. Steger could have admitted that he had failed the victims and their families. However, as is becoming far too common, Steger treated the incident as if it were some kind of natural disaster that could only be reacted to, and could never have been prevented or even mitigated.
Did George W. Bush ever admit that he had failed us in 9/11? Why do we speak of the Cuban Missile Crisis as something that JFK “handled” rather than essentially caused?
One reason is that the abdication of responsibility is the fundamental precept of our overarching government. The greater the personal responsibility, the less the need for the nanny state. It is not easy to determine if the leadership is simply trying to pull the wool over our eyes, or really believes all the bull. I would argue that most politicians these days are probably quite sincere in their misguided contention that the State is always the answer, given three full generations of the Federal Leviathan.
Thus, the immediate calls for more gun control in the wake of this incident. But, there were many more patterned responses.
Since the perp was a Korean immigrant, there were remarks about excessive immigration and too much diversity. Pat Buchanan did make a good point about an overabundance of tolerance being given to the aberrant. Cho had a long history of being a sociopath, yet no matter what he did, there were no consequences, at least until poet Nikki Giovanni got him kicked out of her class at V-Tech. Even then, though, this was more a case of NIMBY (not in my backyard) than actually doing anything constructive about this misfit. One can’t help but wonder what would have happened if the class were taught by someone less famous.
Giovanni told the press that after she heard about the shootings, she was sure that Cho was the perp. Unsettling enough for you? Oddly reminiscent of FBI agents talking about their pre-September 11th investigations into the 9/11 perps that were blown off?
Perhaps that will put to rest all the foolish clamoring for insight into why Cho did what he did. Clearly, knowing what creates a mass killer is pointless if nothing is done as the signs manifest themselves.
Is it more than a coincidence that in the same week as the V-Tech shootings, our Supreme Court finally pulls in the reins on partial birth abortion? This, of course, was followed by the chorus of all the genteel proponents of this barbarous technique, telling women how their rights are being taken away from them.
Just keep that in mind next time there is a tragedy like the one at V-Tech, when someone asks you about the value of human life. Based on the pro-aborts’ reaction to the Supreme Court decision, and knowing that nothing will change as a result of this latest massacre, I’d say it is damned little.
Even the 3000 deaths of 9/11 brought us only Kabuki Theater airport security, joined at the hip to an incredibly lax immigration and enforcement policy. You’d think that protecting the public safety would be the most basic function of government—but you’d be wrong. Its most basic, and its only function now is to grow. It knows that most of the public will soon get over this week’s tragedy, but if it doesn’t, the net result is just the accumulation of more power.