Bite Size Blog Bits

So far, the Tigers have failed to suck completely this year, tentatively proving that last season wasn't just some wonderful fever dream I experienced. They're not awesome, but a solid 11-8, with a number of losses coming in extra innings. Way to gut it out Tigers! But you closers need to see me after class.
UPDATE: Goddamn it, you are so getting detention, Jones. 11-9.

Friends (Fried Chicken Head over there) visited last weekend, and I'm happy to report that despite some extremely sore muscles (who knew Muir woods was so big, especially if you ignore signs and go the wrong way and don't wear proper footwear?) a good time was had by all. That is in large part an assumption by me, but as there was little scowling, I am happy to make it.

Golden Gate Park is just hilarious. Of course I've been there a number of times now, but on Sunday there was a free concert. Normally the label "free" is more than enough reason to get San Fran's local hippies in attendance, but this concert had the added bonus of a former Grateful Dead-er (I'm told) and a guy with the last name "Marley". This deadly combination lured in every star child, burnout, reggae fan, and otherwise granola individual in, I'm certain, a 200-mile radius.

Grindhouse was long but pretty damn entertaining. I have not been to the movies since I saw it, however, which is a long time for me.

Having a full-time (for all intents and purposes) puts a real strain on my leisure time. An hour-long commute each way isn't convenient either, but I'd be lying if I said it was as bad as it sounds. I like reading the paper in the morning, and doing the crossword (M-W with ease; Thurs-Fri crosswords seem to increase in difficulty by an order of magnitude) in the evening.

Warcraft is what suffers, ultimately. It's not going to be work (I don't yet have the job, and frankly I like what I'm doing at the moment) or the girlfriend (for obvious reasons) or Lost (man has it gotten better this last month). Since it's a video game, I'm not too concerned.

Seriously though, how good IS Lost these days? I don't mind the filler episodes (i.e. Hurley's magic bus, Sawyer trying to turn good) but they've been making some leaps and bounds as far as plot advancement. I expect it will all die down in May with an incomprehensible season finale.

This kid? Totally me, except for the ability to dissect things with skill. I lacked that. Otherwise it's a pretty dead-on portrayal of my 7th grade experience.

That was too many bullets. Consider my chamber emptied! That was not supposed to sound as uncomfortably gross as it now appears.

Of Two Minds

Everybody insists on making the Virginia Tech tragedy some sort of referendum on gun control. It's a completely insipid endeavor, and I'll tell you why.

It's one incident. It was horrible and tragic, but it was one killer (as far as we know), one set of motivations, and two handguns. You cannot lift from this series of events ANY clear answer about gun control or lack thereof.

Virginia Tech doesn't allow guns on campus. The right-wing nuts point out that this didn't stop the killer, and of course it didn't; Virginia allows guns practically anywhere. The on-campus gun ban is merely a policy, but it is impossible to enforce as a preventative matter. The same can be said for the D.C. gun ban, which has not eliminated gun deaths in the District. Sure, the police can tag you with an extra charge after they catch you, but it doesn't stop anybody from getting a gun in Virginia or Maryland and walking across the district line.

My point is not to argue gun control; it is simply to illuminate the utter stupidity of people who are arguing gun control in this situation. We don't know why, or how, he did what he did, and we don't know what would have stopped him.

The second popular argument is that if the students and/or professors had been armed, it wouldn't have been so bad. This is such a wild assumption it's barely worth mentioning. Who is to say that anyone would have been able to take this guy out? He killed 30 people with handguns; it may be that he was quite skilled as a marksman in that capacity. The odds that a student, barely awake in class, would have the ability to not only draw and fire before being shot, but to not miss and then not be immediately shot in return, seems impossible to accurately measure. The same could be said for a professor.

Not to mention the fact that, were it completely legal for all students and teachers to carry weapons on campus, many students and teachers would not do so. I sure wouldn't have when I was a student.

So that leaves us with a series of maybes; maybe the gunman wouldn't have been able to get guns if the laws were better, and maybe the students or teachers could have been carrying, and maybe some actually would be carrying, and maybe they would have had the speed and luck to shoot at the gunman first, and maybe they wouldn't have missed and been shot themselves.

All those maybes add up to jack squat, in my book. Arguing gun control--pro or con--by using specific, tragic examples is akin to arguing environmentalism by pointing out how often a friend of yours recycles. It's a silly, strawman debate tactic that stinks of exploitation. There is a real discussion to be had regarding guns in America, but Cho Seung Hui does not add a single useful piece of information to that discussion.

Reaction

I can't add anything newsworthy that isn't already covered, or miscovered, by the press. I look forward to hearing the actual story in the days and weeks ahead.

I can't add any anecdotes about the victims or the shooter, as I am too far removed from my days as a Tech student. My heart goes out to those who still have strong personal ties to the Blacksburg community.

I won't add any comments about gun control or campus security. I think they did the best they could.

It is simply a tragedy, and maybe at some later date, when more information on why and how it occurred, more can be said. But for now, it's just sad.

Or... Maybe It Won't

The big news is, of course, that the President and Congress are fighting tooth-and-nail about this whole "troop withdrawal" thing. Congress, echoing what is fairly clearly the will of the people (according to most polls, anyway), wants them out at some point in the foreseeable future. The President, echoing... well his own sense of purpose and probably the sentiments of his staff, thinks that setting any sort of withdrawal date will send a message of defeat to the troops and, more importantly, to the enemy.

These are interesting points. I do not think that the President is way outside the bounds of reality on this, because his concerns--politically motivated or not--seem reasonable. That doesn't outweigh my personal belief that withdrawal should still occur, but I don't immediately dismiss the rationale (that it will aid our enemy)put forth by the administration. That is, I didn't until I really considered what effect it could have.

Here's my thought: if I'm a terrorist, or just someone who doesn't want the USA in my country, blowing up my friends and family, I might take up arms and fight them. If I hear that the USA has no plans on leaving anytime soon, my strategy (and this is just me, I don't actually have any "freedom fighter" friends, that I know of) would be the same as what the actual insurgents seem to be using: keep killing soldiers until it becomes to costly for the U.S.

As an insurgent, I'm probably not too concerned about how this costliness actually manifests itself; whether it's massive public outcry, a political turnover (like the 2006 elections), or actual budgetary concerns. I just want them to leave.

Now enter the "troop withdrawal date". Instead of hearing that the Americans are hear to help my country by shooting its people ad infinitum, I hear they will shoot for awhile longer, and then leave. Perhaps not soon--not until late 2008, for instance, which is almost 18 months away. But the key is the knowledge of a date when they will cease actively trying to kill me.

In my mind, this creates a different sort of response. Why should I risk my life on a daily basis when, at some stated date, the oppressors of my country will leave? Why not take a breath or two, and reevalute my goals regarding insurgency? It seems to me that, whatever their motives are for constantly trying to kill American troops (or blowing up parts of their own country), those motives become less urgent if the American presence has an expiration date.

Of course, perhaps the "signal of weakness", as characterized by the President, would encourage an escalation of violence (the theory being that if they're willing to leave in X months, maybe we can make them leave now if we hit harder). I do not know nearly enough about... well, anything involved in this sort of analysis, to make an educated guess.

But I think the opponents of troop-withdrawal (those who aren't simply parroting the party line and have a legitimate beef with the idea) have overlooked the possibility that it will have a calming effect. After all, Iraq needs to stand on its own someday, and the complete lack of any idea when that will be can only serve to frustrate the hell out of those fighting for it.