A Bloody Day In Blacksburg, VA

At the Eschaton crack-den, we have been consumed with the events unfolding in the case of the mass murder of as many as 30 or more members of the university community at Virginia Tech.

The subject is compelling, and has consumed much energy. The pain felt is visceral, for all that the connection is but virtual.

The frailties felt in the aftermath of this horrific event, and the confusion engendered by the inability of the authorities to swiftly identify the killer, were enough to fray the nerves. But added to all this, tomorrow (4/17) was to have been the day on which Alberto (we all call him "Abu" in honor of his relationship with the tortures at Abu Ghraib) Gonzales was to have enacted the next act in the kabuki drama surrounding the firing of eight US Attorneys, an act never before recorded in the entire 233-year annals of USer Justice.

Near the end of the day, a commenter, m***, replies to another, t***, and her complaint of horror fatigue:
T*** - I don't know if it's horror-fatigue, but I'm just not sure I want to know. Why do we as a nation tolerate this shit?
m*** | 04.16.07 - 7:11 pm

Me? Automatically, I think: this isn't just a rhetorical question. So off the top 'o me fuzzy, bald pate, I replied:

M***: When you throw 300 million people together in a dog-eat-dog competitive society, with declining resources, artificial scarcities, and zero-sum rules for everything from kindergarten to love and sex;
and then put at the disposal of the frantic, obsessive creatures scurrying around under the ultimate pressure of "success" in this insane environment--it's not just school/job/love, it's the REST OF YOUR FUCKING LIFE--
virtually unlimited fire-power, and a media culture that idolizes and is saturated with voyeuristic violence, SOMEBODY (what are the odds? 1-300,000,000; lottery odds) is gonna crack...

Now add to this the fact that everybody in the game knows--at some level, and despite acre -feet of denial--in their heart of hearts, that they are not only doomed but disposable.

There are three or four senseless, stupid, horrific, more or less spontaneous mass-murders every WEEK in the (well-armed) blood-soaked USofA; to say nothing of the other, non-incidental, crime-related multiple executions...

What makes the events of today at VATech so horrific for much of white, middle-america, is that it happened at their (not literally, of course) alma mater.

Is NOTHING SACRED? Why, that girl coud have been Judy Garland, the killer Mickey Rooney.

Rather, it seems, the killer was a love-struck (obsessive), rejected (failed) "Sabu" (such because I cannot think of an "Asian" hero of the Garland/Rooney era...just saying), who cracked, loaded up on advanced weaponry and rage, and commenced to killing. The children of white, middle america , were slaughtered arbitrarily, innocent victims of ruthless, premeditated insanity, somewhere where they were supposed to be "safe." They happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time. A tragedy.

Meanwhile, at least 7 USer soldiers were killed in Iraq today, too; along with so-far-unreported numbers other innocent Iraqi victims of ruthless, premeditated insanity; a different description, perhaps, but not really of a different kind.