The day after, more of the same

By Michael J.W. Stickings

The latest: "A suicide bomber breached Baghdad's heavy security presence again Thursday, killing a dozen people in a mostly Shiite district a day after more than 230 people died in one of the Iraq war's deadliest episodes of violence... The bombing killed at least 12 people and wounded 34. Two Iraqi soldiers were among the fatalities." Plus: "The U.S. military on Thursday announced three more troop deaths – two soldiers killed Wednesday by a roadside bomb north of Baghdad, and another soldier killed the same day in a small-arms-fire attack in a southwestern area of the capital."

And yet the Great Virginia Tech Media Orgy continues. I've avoided the other cable news networks this evening, but, flipping by CNN during commercial breaks of the Sens-Pens playoff game on CBC and the Braves-Cubs game on TBS, I've been able to get a good sense of just how insufferable the coverage is. (And, yes, I realize that flipping to CNN is rarely a good idea. This is especially true during the two-hour Zahn-King assault on intelligence and integrity.) And now we're being told of the investigations into the killer's every move in the months, weeks, days, hours, minutes, seconds before the shootings, of childhood bullying and psychotic paranoia, of the plight of Koreans on campus, of... well, you get the idea.

Now let me get back to the Flames-Wings game, and the Canucks-Stars game, and Stewart and Colbert, and Iron Chef America, and...

Anything but this orgy of overkill.