justira | Virginia Tech: This is just NOT ON.

This is NOT ON, world. This is just NOT ON.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/04/16/national/main2686709.shtml

http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/16/vtech.shooting/index.html

http://www.wtop.com/?nid=104&sid=1116587

http://www.wtop.com/?nid=104&sid=1116775

That was my morning dose of heart attack right there. Mike and Lindsey (

lambspam) are alive. I called her the moment I found out. My officemate's son goes there, and he seems to be okay. Another friend knows someone there and he's okay too.

But more than 30 people are still dead, and at least a dozen more injured.

Jesus Christ.

I'm worried sick about he injured. Blacksburg is in the middle of NOWHERE -- they don't have the medical facilities to deal with this! Christansburg is closest and not much better off, Roanoke is at least half an hour's drive away, and Richmond is at least an hour's helicopter flight away. They just don't have the resource to take care of the remaining injured!

My officemate brought something up. WHY are so many school shootings happening in America? What IS IT? WHY? He and I are both from the former Soviet Union, me from Russia and him from Ukraine, I believe. I'm pretty sure that nobody will dispute that the crime rates, including murders and shootings, were, are, and likely will be for a long time yet much worse than in the US. But we never had this kind of -- this violence, this epidemic of paranoia and resentment, that pervades the US educational system and its institutions. I understand only a little better than he does, since I actually went through the system myself, but still, WHY?

What is wrong with this country?