Sometimes I feel like a bullet in the gun of Cho Seung-hui

A few random thoughts about the incident that will forever be known as the Virginia Tech massacre:

• A neighbor described the 23-year-old gunman, Cho Seung-hui, as "very quiet, always by himself." As KJ and I listened to the earliest news reports on the shootings — hours before the perpetrator was identified — I said to her, "Just wait: When they figure out who did this, someone will describe the guy as 'a quiet man... good neighbor... kept to himself.'" It's scary when I'm right.
  
  
• Given that Cho was a card-carrying legal immigrant, I can hardly wait for the first salvos from the anti-immigration whack-jobs, saying, "This is why we gotta keep them [racist characterization deleted] outa our country."
  
  
• That salvo will be followed shortly by another from the gun lobby whack-jobs, saying, "If every student at Va. Tech had been packing a TEC-9, this guy wouldn't have killed so many people."
  
  
• Already, every would-be pop psychologist is breaking down the myriad reasons why Cho got up yesterday morning and murdered 32 people. What's wrong with the obvious answer: "The dude was a whack-job"?
  
  
• Note to future suicidal mass murderers: Given that you're going to end the deal by killing yourself anyway, couldn't you just start there? I'm not advocating ritual seppuku as a valid means of resolving one's personal issues. I'm just thinking we might be able to get you the death you want anyway, without a bunch of other people losing their lives, who had absolutely nothing to do with your inner demons.
  
  
• Right decent of El Presidente to pop over to Va. Tech for a platitude-laden photo op. Maybe the 33 deaths for which Cho was responsible will deflect at least a modicum of attention from the 3,300 American deaths for which Bush is responsible.
  
  
• You just know that the delay in action on the part of the university administration and security personnel between the first and second shooting incidents is going to make a passel of lawyers extremely wealthy.
  
  
• Small consolation, but the Va. Tech massacre outstripped the previous U.S. mass shooting deaths record-holder, Charles Whitman, by a factor of more than 100%. If you're going to go off, go off big, I suppose.
  
  
• Probably a trivial query in the midst of this maelstrom, but you know how my twisted mind works: What's a Hokie, anyway?