We now know the identity of the person responsible for yesterday's rampage in Blacksburg, Virginia. He's Cho Seung-hui, an English major and a legal immigrant with a Green Card. That pretty much debunks one of the early operating presumptions that this was linked to al-Qaeda or an illegal alien.
Also interesting is that the profile describes him as a "loner." Maybe it's me, but that's a frightening concept. I don't socialize perhaps as much as I should and tend to be rather introverted, and in the minds of some of the most cynical cops I could fit the profile, too. But does that mean I'm going to explode at any moment on a scale like this?
No, of course not.
Still, it just sickens me that something like this happens. We Canadians aren't immune from school shootings, of course -- think of Dawson College and L'école polytechnique, for instance. But it goes back to the question, why aren't people trying to reach out to these so-called "loners" before it's too late? True, some people put themselves in a box quite on purpose. There had to be warning signs, however.
I don't know how we can make sense of tragedies like this -- all we can work on is constant vigilance.
UPDATE (2:59 PM EDT, 1859 GMT): Am I the only one miffed by the fact PMS said absolutely nothing about this tragedy?
UPDATE #2 (6:08 PM EDT, 2208 GMT): He did, during Question Period -- but that was fully 24 hours after Tony Blair made light of it in his monthly confab at Number 10.
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