News of the Times

As everyone's heard by now, there was a horrific tableau yesterday at Virginia Tech University -- a gunman kills 32 students over the course of a few hours. It has been called many things by the news media -- "bloodbath," "tragedy" -- but the New York Times front page leaps out at me the most. "Rampage." A very specific term that brings me back to another tragedy a few years ago.

The Virginia assault is the deadlest rampage in American history, to be sure, but in this dark hour of loss I want to remind us all of the second deadliest rampage in American history, lest we forget.


May the survivors of that forgotten tragedy find the peace they deserve.