I very, very much agree with Ross on this:
I'm extremely skeptical, though, that there's actually anything significant to learn about gun policy from yesterday's violence: Extreme, unpredictable events like this one seem like precisely the kind of thing that shouldn't dictate lawmaking decisions (though of course they inevitably do). If there's a case for gun control, it's in the daily run of shooting deaths that don't make the front page; if there's a case against gun control, it's in the daily run of crimes deterred by an armed citizenry (and in more abstract questions of personal liberty), not in the faint chance that a kid with a conceal-and-carry permit might have taken the Virginia killer down.
When I read about the character being created out of Cho -- a morose, depressed, hateful, anti-social, quiet, loner -- all I can think is how common such characteristics are. There were kids who fit the bill in my high school, in my neighborhood, in my colleges. There must be thousands, possibly millions, of kids who are seen, at least by some, as fitting this description.
Which is why we have to remember that Cho is the only person who's ever done a spree killing of this size in America. Ever. The data shows that Cho was a danger to society, but the data also shows, overwhelmingly, that most kids who seem like Cho aren't. This was an awful event, but for now, I think it's better treated as an anomaly rather than a precursor or part of a pattern.
