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Draft Charter for Europe Points the Way to a Bigger World Role. A draft constitution for an enlarged European Union was unveiled on Monday, pointing the way toward creating a greater European presence on the world stage. By Paul Meller. [Headlines From The NY Times (10/29/2002)]

As the European Union plans its growth, the United States will need to re-evaluate our own position in the world as a whole.  As noted in the NY Times:

With about 445 million citizens, the European Union will have a much larger population than the United States, something the drafters of the constitution want reflected in its role in international affairs.

Given the policy contained in Bush's recently released "National Security Strategy of the United States," states that America, as the world's strongers nation, "will never again allow its military supremacy to be challenged as it was during the cold war" (NY Times, Oct 26, 2002), we're either going to have to have an excellent relationship with Europe and learn to "share", or we may be in for a very serious fight.

"Almost every part of the Bush doctrine can be defended except that assertion," said Kurt Campbell, a Pentagon official in the Clinton administration who is now senior vice president of the Washington-based Center for Strategic and International Studies. "It not only says that we're Hertz," he said, "but that we're going to discourage strong market competition from Avis."

To much of the world, he argues, "the doctrine says: we know best." He continued, "At some point, even if you are democratic and wildly successful, we are going to discourage your growth."

I have to admit, I would not want to see the US be taken over by another country. While I may not like everything we do, and agree with even less of it, I do still realize that this is one of, if not the, best places to live in the world, an I enjoy the benefits of that.  But I also don't think it is necessarily our place to keep everyone else "small". 

If the European Union does grow to be significantly larger than we are, they, by rights, should be able to have the kind of an army that can defend themselves, should it be necessary.  Yes, that might mean that they could be a potential threat to us, but I believe that its a threat that could be neutralized by maintaining positive relations with them, not by trying to restrict their 'homeland security' options.

Right now, the European Union is working on putting together the documents that will help form and shape what that will become.  There is some talk of structuring it similar to how the US is, with the different nations being the counterpart for our states. It seems to me that during this time, while they're trying to figure out who and what they will become, rathering than issuing doctrines indicating that we will challenge anyone who dares to be as strong as we are, we should work with them to help ensure that whatever form they eventually take will be something we can work with, and not have to fight against.

When the Spam Hits the Blogs. The latest trick of bulk e-mail marketers is to hit the referral logs of popular weblogs, and the bloggers are hopping mad. By Michelle Delio. [Wired News]

Joy of all joys, spammers are now trying to use referral logs and automatically updated link-back listings as ways of spreading their own trash. So far, I haven't had any such problems on any of my blog sites (but then again, I don't have that much of a readership yet), and I very much hope that I won't.  Unfortuantely, aside from not using the referral log or auto link-backs, I'm not sure what can be done.

It bothers me, though, that spammers can piggyback on the sites and materials we've created in order to try and reach an audience.  It reminds me, in some ways, of the "Surf +" an "smart links" concepts, where browsers or browser add-ins could create additional links on any page being viewed that would link to other sites, generally commercial sites that had bought the right to be linked to a certain word.  In that case, the Surf +/smartlinks proprietors were "piggybacking" on an individual's website, using it for adverstising, yet providing no compensation to the person who had designed and/or maintains the site. I wouldn't be very happy if someone came around and painted a billboard sign on my house - especially if they thought they didn't need to pay for it - and I feel no different about my website.

Whether it's filling a referral log/auto link-back with commercial links or adding links to words that have been sold to the highest bidder, the marketer and the advertisor are profiting off of my (or any other webmaster's) own work.  We either need to be provided compensation for the traffic they receive as a result of our work (and have the option to opt-out entirely if we don't WANT our websites used for commercial purposes) or they need to find new tactics.

In Trail of Red Flags, an Ex-Friend's Warning to the Authorities Stands Out. A former friend of John Allen Muhammad said on Sunday that she drove him to a backyard gunsmith last fall to have a semiautomatic rifle made shorter and silent. By Charlie Leduffand Dean E. Murphy. [New York Times: National]

Between all of the missed clues before 9/11 and the missed clues we're learning about now regarding the sniper, I'm beginning to think that maybe the TIPS program that John Ashcroft wants so badly isn't such a threat after all. 

According to the New York Times, there are now at least three separate occasions on which the federal authorities were warned about John Allen Muhammad and concerns that he may be planning something dangerous.  As one FBI spokesperson commented, they do get a lot of tips all the time.  When you get three tips, however, on the same person, it might it not be prudent to check them out?

Two of the calls were made post-9/11, one from the operator of a homeless shelter who was concerned that Muhammad might have ties to a terrorist group, and one from a former friend who provided details to the FBI about modifications he wanted made to a gun.  Also during this time, which was roughly December of last year,  Muhammad was involved in a domestic disturbance at the homeless shelter involving Malvo and Malvo's mother.  Malvo and his mother were turned over to the INS, and a hearing was set up for Malvo that was scheduled to take place in November of this year.

Sadly, it seems that too often after a major crime, it turns out that law enforcement had been warned - generally more than once or even twice - that the eventual perpetrator is someone who should be looked at as a possible source of concern.  Given how often it seems that a truly dangerous person slips through the cracks, and given that the reason usually given is that they receive so many tips, I have to wonder if the problem is that they're too incompetent to tell the difference between the ones they should be worrying about and the ones they apparently are worrying about - or maybe if they actually are preventing a lot more crimes than we know about by following up on the tips that they do.

The bad thing is, I'm not sure which of those possiblities is more frightening

And now, this breaking news report on something

By HOWARD TROXLER, Times Columnist

© St. Petersburg Times
published October 23, 2002

[...] ANCHOR: And now here's a roundup of other news. There's war with Iraq, the midterm elections for control of Congress, a reeling economy, forgotten corporate scandals and the World Series. Okay, that covers that. Now back to our round-the-clock coverage. Wait a minute . . . we're hearing now that there might be a new fact in the case.    [...]

Howard Troxler may say that he's not trying to be funny at a time like this, but good satire can make you laugh while pricking you with some very sharp points, and this commentary succeeds at both quite well.

I chose to excerpt the above paragraph because it just rings far too true.  The whole piece is lie that, this was just my favourite bit.

Sniper Suspect Obtained a Rifle Despite a Restraining Order and Gun Laws. Under federal law, John Allen Muhammad was barred from buying or possessing a firearm because his second wife had taken out a domestic-violence restraining order against him in March 2000. By Fox Butterfield. [New York Times: National]

As with most things, my views on gun control tend to lean towards the left.  I think that Americans should have the right to keep and bear arms, but that the government has the right to maintain records of who has what in order to help track down criminals - for example, the suggestion of maintaining ballistic fingerprints of guns.  Yes, they can be altered, and no, they won't be foolproof, but they could help with solving crimes much faster than they're solved now - and, as in the case of the sniper, might help prevent some deaths or other crimes.  I don't see that it's such a significant intrusion on the right to own guns that it should be discarded out of hand.

Implementing better gun control measures, however, doesn't mean that we have to create a whole raft of new laws.  I'd be happy with making sure all current laws are properly and fully enforced as a starting point and see what is needed from there.

Muhammad was initially arrested on illegal gun posession charges related to a gun he had actually sold back in 2000.  See, in March of 2000, Muhammad's second ex-wife had taken out a domestic violence-related restraining order against him.  The restraining order not only precluded him from making contact with his ex-wife, it also meant he was not allowed to own or possess any firearms.  In May of 2000, he sold a Bushmaster rifle.  It was his posession of that rifle between March and May of 2000 that was the basis for the firearms charge against him.  Frighteningly, it took until May of 2002 - over 2 years after the order was issued - for it to be listed in the main FBI database.  During that time, had anyone done a background check outside the state of Washington to see if it was ok to sell Muhammad a gun, they would have not have been notified of the restriction placed on him because of the restraining order.

What's worse, the gun he used to kill his 10 victims and would 3 others, was shipped from the Bushmaster factory in June of 2002.  It is not known yet where or how he came to be the owner, but in all liklihood, he either slipped through the cracks (which there are far to many of to begin with), obtained the gun by giving false information for use in the bakground check or he purchased it at a gunshow where no background checks are required.

What it all boils down to, though, is that he should not have been able to obtain a gun, and yet he did. This is a serious problem.

As the above-cited article notes, both the gunshow loophole and the 2+ year delay in getting information entered into the FBI's database could be resolved, but political opponants are blocking them.

As for why it took so long to enter the restraining order into the F.B.I. computer, law enforcement officials said it was not unusual for the process to take months or longer.

A Justice Department study last January estimated that there were two million restraining orders around the nation, but that only 590,000 had been entered in the system.

A bill that would give the states $375 million a year for the next three years to catch up on the backlog passed the House of Representatives but has been stalled in the Senate by opposition from Republicans.

In recent years bills to close the so-called gun show loophole, in which a background check is not required when a gun is bought at a gun show, have faced strong opposition from the National Rifle Association. None have passed.

If it turns out that the gun was bought at a gunshow, maybe it will finally be enough to give Congress the balls to stand up to the NRA and close that loophole.  There's no excuse for it, and if it is costing us lives (which I believe it is) there's no justification for continuing it.   And hopefully Congress will also realize that a 2-year backlog on getting information entered into a database to help ensure that the wrong people don't get guns is also unjustifiable, and need to be corrected as soon as possible.

In just a few days we have an election where all members of the House of Representatives and 1/3 of the Senate will be chosen by their constituants.  Perhpas this should be an issue to take into consideration when casting your vote.  The problem isn't limited to the DC area - it could happen anywhere - and something like it is almost guaranteed to happen again if the loophole isn't closed and the database isn't brought - and kept - current.

WashPost: Almost everything sniper pundits told media was wrong. So much for the so-called experts. Paul Farhi and Linton Weeks write: "The important question is, was the orgy of speculation harmless -- or was there a very dangerous undercurrent to it? By saturating the public's consciousness with phantom images of thirtyish white men, did the media profilers distract attention from a more general and possibly open-minded search for the perpetrators?" A CNN senior veep says: "We have no regrets. . . . I think we were very responsible." (Washington Post)

• Kurtz: Unreleased info aired on TV news helped crack case (WashPost)
• CNN confirms it considered using "C.S.I." actors as pundits (NYT/r.r.)
• No TV pundit got even the broadest outlines of the story right (Newsday)
• Rosenberg praises CNN reporter Arena for saying, "I don't know" (LAT/r.r.)
• Rosenstiel: Washington media were "responsible, restrained" (WashTimes)
• Powers: Bare-bones wire stories epitomize new world of news (NatJournal) 
• Journalism prof says media were aiding, abetting sniper (MSNBC.com)

Several excellent articles on the abundence - and incorrectness - of much of the profiling done on TV during the sniper chase.  From Jim Romenesko's MediaNews

First Worm with a EULA?. ErikRed1488 writes "There is a new virtual postcard from Friend Greetings, owned by Permissioned Media that prompts you to install their software to view the ... [Slashdot]

Now this is a clever trick.  Since most people don't read the end-user license agreement (EULA) for software that they install, people who get this software will most likely install it without realizing that they're giving permission to Permissioned Media to send out mails to people in their Outlook address book and install whatever other software they may want to in the future.

Technically, this isn't a worm or a virus - it's advertising software designed to monitor user behaviour and deliver targeted ads using the information gathered while monitoring.  According to the Permissioned Media site, the software is bundeled with several different programs, including .mp3 players, screen savers, shopping programs and others.

Two years ago in Missouri, the former Democrat Governor, Mel Carnahan, was killed in a plane crash shortly before the 2000 elections.  Since they were unable to get a new official candidate on the ticket in time, Carnahan's widow, Jean, agreed to accept the Governor's appointment to the Senate to serve her husband's term should he win the election.  Which he did - beating John Ashcroft (and I've never ceased wondering why on Earth Bush would want to appoint a man to his cabinet who not only could not win as an incumbent in a state that often leans Repubican, but couldn't even beat a dead man).

Even though I'm a Kansan, I live close to the Kansas/Missouri borderline, and much of the news coverage here is focused on the Missouri side of that line.  I recall it being a difficult time - not just for people close to the Carnahans, but also for the citizens of Missouri in general.  Mel Carnahan was a very well-liked man and his death was a shock to a great many people.

Today, we learn, that Senator Paul Wellstone, Democrat in Minnesota, has been killed in a plane crash, shortly before the 2002 elections. Even more tragic, it sounds as though his wife and possibly children, were killed as well.

Wellstone has been a big target of the Republicans this year, largely because he has a reputation as one of the most liberal Senators currently in office.  While I know that this year's race has been tight and that - given the slim margin of control in the Senate - each race is cruical to each party, I hope that we won't be hearing of any tasteless jokes or expressions of relief that Wellstone is now "out of the way".  While it may sound somewhat outrageous that I would express any concern about that at all, what's worse is that I'd feel the need to express the same concern, even if has been a popular Republican that had died.  I have that little faith in the humanity of all our politicians.

I do want to extend my condolences to any who knew and loved Senator Wellstone and his family.  No loss is ever an easy one.  I also wish to extend them to the citizens of Minnesota.  Having seen how a death like this - right before an election - can cause a great dea of confusion. I hope that you will all be granted the comfort you need, and deserve, by Whatever or Whomever you hold sacred.

Bare bellies provoke a wobbly. Last week a group of angry young women stormed the offices of The Newcastle Herald to protest against columnist Jeff Corbett and his opinion of female midriff fashions, "belly blubber" and "horribly deep navels"... "At an age when girls should be striving to be pleasing to the eye, the male eye, these young women were going to serious lengths to expose an acre of wobbling excess. Haven't they looked in the mirror?"... Then he described exposed bellies as a form of terrorism." [Daily Rotten]

Ok, I'm a fat woman, so when I read an article like this, I tend to take more offense than others might.  But more than anything else, the assertion Corbett makes that there should ever be a time when girls should strive to be pleasing to the male eye, bothers me.

It's true that for most "love" relationships there needs to be some physical attraction - but that need should pass fairly quickly, as the physical body is one of the most changable aspects of a person, making it very unstable to build a relationship upon. 

Unfortunately, there are so many sources of pressure on women - especially young women - to conform to a certain body-type that we've seen a grave increase in eating disorders.  Anorexia is becoming almost commonplace as young girls stive to be pleasing to the male eye, as is bulimia. There are even "support" groups now for people who think they have the right to choose to be anorexic if they so wish.  I know many, many times I prayed and wished that I could be anorexic because I was so desparate to lose the weight I had gained - not so much so that I could be attractive, but so that people could quit being cruel to me.  Had I been a weaker person - and there are many times I've wished for that as well - I can easily see that I would have killed myself long before now.

Many will say that being fat is a choice - and that all one needs to do is eat less and exercise more to lose it.  Speaking from personal experience, however, I can tell you it's not that simple.  There are many reasons why a person will gain or carry extra weight.  But you know what? The whys of it shouldn't matter.  A fat person is still a person, with all the intelligence, emotions, spirit and such as any other.  I someone is not attracted to fat people sexually, that is, of course, their progative.  What I disagree with is with the constant message being presented by society, the media and peers that it is some kind of moral failing or social wrong to be fat.

An Angry Telephone Call Provided One Crucial Clue. The first real break in the sniper case came last Thursday in an angry phone call from a man claiming responsibility for a murder-robbery in Montgomery, Ala. By Eric Lichtblau and Don Van Natta Jr.. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]

Today has been filled with good new about the sniper case, and everyone is spending a lot of time patting themselves and each other on the back.  But just wait, in a couple of days the criticism will start - did the police do all they could? Did the media say or do enough or too much? Should some clues have been recognized as important long before they were?

The story of how the pieces fell together is interesting, if a bit convoluted. The first piece of the solution came about on October 8th when a policeman in Baltimore noticed a man sleeping in his car - a blue Chevy Caprice - and made note of the car and its license plate.  At the time, no one recognized the car as being significant.  I suspect this will be the point over which there will be the most fingerpointing - people saying that he should have realized at that point what he had, thus ending the killings nearly 2 weeks before he was actually caught.  Unless there is other information I'm not aware of, however, I don't see that the office can be faulted.  There had, early on, been one report - one - of a dark Chevy Caprice being seen at one of the crime scened, but by the 8th, the focus for a possible vehicle had shifted to a white van or white box truck.  Add to that the conventional wisdom (and stated by profilers) that the suspect would be a white make in his 20's or 30's, and I think it's understandable why a cop might not have been overly suspicious of a black man in his 40's in a dark Caprice.

The next "break" in the case came once the police and the sniper began their odd communication. Apparently, the sniper called the police but the operator initially thought he was a crank caller.  He told her to check "Montgomery" if they wanted to verify that he was who he said he was, but since much of the killing had taken place in Montgomery County, MD, they cops didn't initially realize what the caller was referring to.  And interesting detail that the article provides is how the cops finally became aware of what it was the caller was referring to:  Apparently feeling that the police weren't taking him terribly seriously, he placed calls to two priests to see if he could get them to give a message to the police.  In an interesting bit of irony, the police contacted one of those churches the day after they received the call as they thought the killer might be a parishoner (though I've yet to find out why that is).  In the process of discussing that possibility, the Monsingior told the police of the call he had received, which specified that the police should be checking in Montgomery, Alabama.

Once they called law enforcement officials in Alabama, they learned of a shooting that had taken place there in late September, and that there had been an unidentified fingerprint found at the scene.  The local police in Alabama did not have access to the federal fingerprint files, and so they weren't able to make a match, but the federal officers working on the sniper case did, and traced the fingerprint to to the 17-year-old suspect.  That is what led them to search the home in Tacoma. 

As they gathered more information about the sniper, one of the things that cropped up was the description and license number of the car from back on October 8th.  Once the police scanners and news media began broadcasting that number it was essentially just a matter of time.  At 3am, a trucker pulled into a rest stop, noticed the car, realized the license number was a match and called the police.

While I still think the media has spent far too much time on this story and too much time in not only useless, but - as we can now see, misleading - speculation, I do have to give them props for having gotten that license plate number out.  That made it possible for the trucker to realize that he had found the car and facilitated the arrest of the suspects.

I have to wonder, though, if we hadn't been hearing so much about the "standard" profile of a serial killer, or speculation on what the killer might be like, if people would have been more open to a wider range of possible suspects that could have ended the killings sooner. I think one big quesation that will need to be answered is how the "white van/truck" became so much a focus of the investigation.  I suspect that because white vans and trucks are rather popular, and becuase the media had made several mentions of a white van or truck that witnesses were somewhat primed to see a white van, so if, in the confusion after the shooting, a white van happened to be in the area (which isn't that unlikely an occurrance), people would remember it.

Hopefully, this will be the end of the matter, and there are no other people out there who were part of the killings.  And hopefully, as the post-mortem is done on how the investigation - and, just as importantly, the coverage of the investigation - was handled, both law enforcement and the media will learn the kinds of lessons that can help catch the next person who goes on a killing spree even faster.

Gunmen hold Moscow theater crowd

Audience held hostage after mid-performance raid

BREAKING NEWS

Moscow, Oct. 23 — Up to 30 armed men seized a Moscow theater in the middle of a performance on Wednesday, firing shots into the air and taking the audience hostage, the Federal Security Service said.

From the scant information that has been received so far, the kidnappers seem to be speaking in a Chechnian language, and have allowed children and Muslims leave.  Other captives have been allowed to use their phones.

This is a story I'd like very much to learn more about, but CNN, MSNBC and FOX NEWS are, of course, still covering the sniper story.  This actually manages to create an intersection of 2 of my recent complaints - that American's are far too self-centered and care little about what happens outside our borders, and the obsessive coverage of the sniper story. 

Why is something like this given such a low priority just beause it happens away from our shores?  1,000 people under threat and being help hostage should, one would think, be a major story, regardless of where the incident is taking place.

For Bush, Facts Are Malleable
Presidential Tradition Of Embroidering Key Assertions Continues

By Dana Milbank
Washington Post Staff Writer
Tuesday, October 22, 2002; Page A01

President Bush, speaking to the nation this month about the need to challenge Saddam Hussein, warned that Iraq has a growing fleet of unmanned aircraft that could be used "for missions targeting the United States."

Last month, asked if there were new and conclusive evidence of Hussein's nuclear weapons capabilities, Bush cited a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency saying the Iraqis were "six months away from developing a weapon." And last week, the president said objections by a labor union to having customs officials wear radiation detectors has the potential to delay the policy "for a long period of time."

All three assertions were powerful arguments for the actions Bush sought. And all three statements were dubious, if not wrong. Further information revealed that the aircraft lack the range to reach the United States; there was no such report by the IAEA; and the customs dispute over the detectors was resolved long ago.

While we are getting the 24-7 treatment of the sniper story, news such as that above is getting pushed off of the front page and out of the headline summaries.  Yet the news above is what will have a greater impact on far more Americans than the DC sniper ever will.

As far as I've been able to determine - and it is always possible that I've missed a few things along the way - not one of  Bush's excuses for attacking Iraq, with the possible exception that this is the guy who tried to kill his Dad, has stood up to scruitny.  In addition to the claims and refutations listed above, Bush claims he's concerned about their weapons of mass desctruction - which have yet to be proved to exist - yet has not indicated what, or even IF, he has any plans for dealing with North Korea's nukes.

The article also lists several items from Bush's October 7th speech in support of the idea of a war with Iraq and provides counter-arguments to each, and looks at some other statemens he's made during his presidency and the problems with them as well.

There's no doubt that the deaths of 10 individuals in the Washingtion DC area is horrific and tragic, or that the families of all those assaulted have bee changed forever.  What concerns me, though, is that because of the wall-to-wall coverage of the sniper case, we're not hearing about these distortions.  If we do get involved in a shooting war, there will be a lot more than 10 people killed. 

New York Bill on Gay Rights Is Set for Vote. The Republican-led New York State Senate will vote for the first time on landmark gay-rights legislation in December after having blocked its passage for decades. By James C. Mckinley Jr.. [New York Times: NYT HomePage]

New York Governor George Pataki, who is facing a serious challenge in his re-election bid from the Independence Party candidate, Thomas Galisano, has been promising for years that he would sign gay-rights legislation, but the Republican-led Senate has consistantly refused to bring it to a vote.  Over the last 18 months, he's told gay-rights activists that he would coerce the Republican leadership to bring it to a vote, and now seems to have finally gotten his way. Expectations are high that once the Senate has a chance to vote on the bill, it will pass and be signed into law.

While this is obviously a political ploy on the part of Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno to help his party have a better chance at keeping the Governorship of New York, the important outcome will be if gays and lesbians have their rights legally secured throughout the state.

In an odd bit of irony, the Houston Chronical is reporting today about the efforts a Texas Republican is taking to derail the election hopes of a fellow Republican who is running for Justice of the Peace.  The article notes:

[Republicans Urged Not to Vote Straight] GOP political activist Dave Wilson has a message for fellow Republicans -- If you vote straight, you vote gay.

Wilson is sending Republican voters an automated telephone message telling them not to vote a straight Republican ticket because it includes a gay candidate. [Houston Chronicle Home Page]

Yeah, you read that right.  Wilson is calling Republicans in one of the Houston Judicial districts to urge Republician voters to vote against Alex Wathen because he's gay.  And he's doing this even though the party leaders would rather that he not - because having Republicans vote a straight Republican ticket helps all of their candidates.  Instructing them not to vote straight Republican, they fear, could weaken other candidates as well.

As Harris County GOP Chairman Jared Woodfill said:

"Why would Dave do this?" Woodfill said. "I mean, I agree with him on the homosexual issue, and the party position on that is clear."

"But it is wrong for Republicans to send the message not to vote straight ticket," he said. "The straight ticket helps all of our judicial races in Harris County."

Why would Dave do this?  Perhaps it has something to do with the official Texas Republican Party platform for 2002, which goes beyong taking a political stance against gay rights and instead goes straight for a carefully worded moral stance that comes close to being against gays, themselves.

The platform says that:

 homosexual "behavior is contrary to the fundamental, unchanging truths that have been ordained by God, recognized by our country's founders and shared by a majority of Texans."

Oh, is that all?

It's sad that in one state, gays are not only being politically maligned, but have apparently offended one of the major political parties to the point that they felt it was necessary to insert a plank condemning homosexual behaviour because it is contrary to the truth of God; and in another state gays are finally having a chance to have their rights enshrined in law, but only because the Governor's re-election bid looks like it might be in danger.

I can only hope that one day the Texas Republicans will figure out that it really doesn't matter what that think God has ordained or forbidden, God has no place in the making of political policy or the passage of laws; and that one day gays will no longer have to hope for a tight election race in order to finally have assurance of their rights.

[Ed.Note: Don't worry, I'll find a new topic soon - this is just one of those things that really frosts my cookies]

Media May Have Unwittingly Foreshadowed Sniper's Moves

By Dru Sefton

c.2002 Newhouse News

The Washington-area sniper may be taking cues from media coverage as to what his next move will be, experts say.

The evidence is mounting:

• Last Friday a former FBI profiler said on CNN, "I could see, he could keep going on down to Ashland, possibly all the way to Richmond ..." The next day, the sniper struck in Ashland, Va.
  
  
• On Oct. 15, The Washington Post ran a story headlined "Weekend Lulls in Shootings Could Offer Clue on Lifestyle," because each shooting had been on a weekday. The next victim was shot the following Saturday.
  
  
• On Oct. 4, 5 and 6, several criminal profilers were quoted on television and in print about how the sniper was "playing God" or "has a God complex." On Oct. 7 the sniper left a tarot card reading, in part, "I am God."
  
  
• On Oct. 3, a Montgomery County official appeared on several national networks, assuring nervous parents. "We feel children will be safe inside schools with us," he said on CNN. On Oct. 7, the sniper shot a student at a Bowie, Md., school.

Given the previous speculation about how much of an impact the media speculation is having on the sniper and his choices, I found this entire article quite interesting. In addition to the above examples, the article talks about how the on-air "profiling" by former FBI agents and former cops could actually lead the suspect to change how he acts in order to avoid conforming to the profile, and how it can also confuse the public. One concern is that if people hear too much about these armchair profiles (armchair because they don't have access to all the info), they might inadvertantly overlook a possible suspect if he doesn't fit what they think they're supposed to be looking for.

I know I've commented on this subject a few times already, but I find it quite disheartening that the media - print and TV - can comment on how the killer seems to be taking cues from the coverage, and yet they don't change how they're covering the case.  If their ethics don't dictate that should exercise more care, common sense should.

This is one of those times I wish Jack McCoy and the other heroes of "Law & Order" were real.  I have no doubt that if he were to see this kind of a pattern emerging - compete with the media recognizing that what they have to say may be helping this guy pick his targets and his timing - and go after the network editors for criminal charges based on their reckless disregard for human life.  The sticking point, of course, would be proving that he wouldn't have killed someone else even if the media wasn't reporting on it, so the case might not go very far, but just getting the charges filed might be sufficient to get a better national debate on where the news media should impose limits on themselves.

I don't mind them reporting the facts - that's their job.  Its the wild speculation that gives me concern.  Under these circumstances, not only does it make no sense, it is, in my opinion, unethical.  They're job is to report what has happened, not create news themselves - and I honestly think that in this case, even if they don't intend to, that is one of the side effects of what they are doing.