News of the Week

[vovat]

I haven't been following much of the media coverage of the Virginia Tech shootings, but I did see someone on O'Reilly last night saying something like, "He didn't have friends, and he didn't want them. Can you imagine someone like that in the workplace?" I also understand that someone is trying to blame video games. Granted, these were both on Fox News, which has never exactly been a pinnacle of tolerance and understanding, but I wouldn't be surprised if such comments were being made in other media. It's disturbingly close to what happened after Columbine (which, incidentally, happened eight years ago yesterday). Because what our country needs is an excuse to ostracize the introverted and socially awkward even MORE, right?

bethje told me about the case of a Lehigh Valley student who inadvertantly took a bag with a knife in it to the airport. Airport security let him go, but the school not only wouldn't let him go on the band trip, but suspended him as well. It strikes me as an extreme case of the "zero tolerance" thing, which seems to be an excuse for administrative laziness. Yeah, don't bother actually investigating individual cases. Just make one across-the-board rule, and then you never have to think about it again, right? Yet there are plenty of people who are fully in support of "zero tolerance" policies, just like they are of politicians who are "tough on crime" (which often means taking the Queen of Hearts approach of "sentence first, verdict afterwards"). School security is an important issue, but I don't think "zero tolerance" is the best solution.

Finally, Alberto Gonzalez apparently can't recall whether he had any part in the firing of federal attorneys. Come on, how many politicians have used that excuse in recent years, and did anyone actually believe ANY of them? Well, okay, maybe when Reagan did it.

I guess that's all for now. Hopefully I'll be covering more pleasant topics in my next post.

Comments

[dragonxbait.livejournal.com]

A friend of ours accidentally brought an illegal knife in his carry-on. It was hunting knife and the blade was longer than is legal in NY (he is from Maine, as was the knife). It had been packed under the liner (which looked extra suspicious) from a previous camping trip and he was unaware of it. They confiscated his knife and refused him entry onto his flight, but he managed to get the charges dropped entirely, and get off with a warning (he has a security clearance so a felony on his record would have meant the end of his job). I wonder though, if they would have been so lenient if hadn't been a college educated white boy.

[vovat.livejournal.com]

Perhaps not. After all, as people like Michael Smerconish and Michelle Malkin know, only Arabs pose a security risk at airports, right?

Seriously, though, I think it's pretty easy to take a small knife somewhere without realizing it. When I worked at the toy store, I'd frequently forget to take the box cutter I was using out of my pocket when I'd finished my shift. And really, once the security people have taken it away, what's left for them to do? I mean, it's POSSIBLE that the person had some kind of hijacking plot, but I wouldn't say a knife is evidence of that in and of itself. And in the case I mentioned, wouldn't you think airport security would know more about what constitutes a serious threat than a school principal would?

[dragonxbait.livejournal.com]

Well...airport security is poorly paid and poorly trained, but yes, they are likely more knowledgeable about security than a high school principal. But authority in public schools is almost always arbitrary and totalitarian, so I am not at all surprised that that was their response.