Thursday, January 13, 2011

The Arizona shooter and higher education

A running theme in many of these shootings is the failure of higher ed to deal with mental health issues at home. This is the case of the VT, Ft Hood and the Arizona shooters. In all cases a clear problem was identified but the ball was dropped.

In the recent case the college did notice that the Arizona shooter was deranged and expelled the student until proof that he had been in treatment was provided. The system could have worked better, but at least the student was expelled before a more dangerous type of VT indecent could have happened there.

Perhaps in the future College Admissions will include the right to seek medical and psychological evaluations and if need be treatment as a contingency for remaining on campus. In the case of the VT shooter concerns had clearly been identified prior to the shooting. Public safety in these issues do trump civil liberties issues.

The Arizona Shooter should continue to embrace Marx and claim Bill Ayers as a role model. Like Ayers, the shooter is incoherent and prone to violence. While in jail he will have plenty of time to study Marx, Fanon, Menchu and Chomsky. The shooter must learn to couch his paranoia about Jews in the terms used by Prof Walt. When he gets out of jail there should be a job in higher ed waiting for him, provided his father makes millions of dollars of donations to the university in question ala Bill Ayers.

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