where would the finger of blame be if the gunman walked 1/2 mile the other direction off campus and killed people in the mcdonalds or a bar...would Steger still be blamed?

Even if a notice that a shooting had happened on campus was sent out prior to the second series of shootings - with the information they had at the time of the first shooting - MOST students would have remained on campus. They DID NOT know what the gunman had planned. They had to treat the first incident as a crime scene; which takes time.

Most students were in transit at between the two incidents; how could they have been reached. NOT POSSIBLE.

Charles Steger DID NOT PULL THE TRIGGER - the blame is with Cho Seung-Hui. Take your anger out on Cho!

It's very possible that there were things that could have been done differently, and Steger may come in for his share of criticism. But I fail to see how people can be so quick to condemn him on the same day that the shootings happened. I'm usually in favor of an aggressively inquisitive press, but the tone of the questions Steger endured yesterday was very offensive to me. While I realize that he was serving as school spokesman, he was also enduring the trauma of this unspeakable tragedy on his campus.

And with all due respect to the parents of the slain students, the fact that they are angry is no surprise. However, that doesn't mean they have access to any more information than anyone else. There will be plenty of time for finger pointing.

It is apparent that the suspect was a loner ...how could anyone know what he was planning?
A sign of concern was responded to by a professor in the form of a counseling referral.
There was no way to know that the bomb threats were possibly tiesd to him or the first shooting.
Hindsight is a wonderful thing - it is so hard to deal with these situations in REAL time.....
I feel for the administrators who may have to feel the inappropriate wrath of those who could have done no better, along with the guilt they'll feel as they second guess themselves for the rest of their lives.
The anger should be directed at the suspect - HE did these horrible acts - others merely respoded to and were effected by them

For those who are quick to critize the response of the university, let me ask you this question. Do the local authorities notify YOU whenever there is a convenience store robbery, armed mugging, or domestic dispute in your city, town, or village?

For all of those that think that would have handled this better I pray you never have to make that decision. There is no way that anyone could have predicted this was going to happen. I read about the first shooting and it never crossed my mind that there would be more to come. I pray these families find peace and I also pray they understand that the school officials did everything they could do. They would have NEVER put all of those people in danger if they had known.
Its a shame that this is what the world is coming to. First the shooting and now everyone trying to blame the school.

If there was any way to stop the sensless violence of someone willing to give their life in a suicide attack, don't you think Israel would have found it? Let's just hope that our society never finds itself in the same position as countries in the middle east.

This is a terrible and tragic event and of course people want answers and someone to blame for the unnecessary loss of life. Unfortunately, the person to blame is also dead. The leaders at VT acted reasonably based on the information they had at the time. At last night's press conference a reporter had the nerve to comment that Chief Flinchum and the other VT administrators were acting dispassionate!! How horrible to say. This man and the rest of the police team have just seen an unspeakable and horrific crime scene and he’s trying to stay calm, rational and in control and find some answers that are definitive. I think the media are the ones that are dispassionate! They feed the social injustice in this country by glamorizing violence and de-sensitizing us all to it. Violence, racism and hatred are societal problems. The moral fiber our nation is hanging on by a thin and frayed thread.

The students of VaTech have shown remarkable common sense and decency in the last 24 hours. Almost every representative of the media that has interviewed students on camera has tried to elicit angry, hostile reactions to the police and school's handling of this horror. But even in the midst of their shock and pain, the students have displayed a level headed maturity, rejecting the efforts of the media to gin up a controversy. The students have been a class act thru this whole nightmare. Their families and community should be very proud of them.

Prehaps all the negative comments should come with suggestions on how to protect all of us from harm, as we go about our daily routine's. I suppose they would find that impossible in today's crazy world, the world WE have created.

I believe that Mr. Steger did the best he could do with the information he had at hand. Why does the media insist on "what ifs"?? Thirty two families lost loved ones in this horrible shooting. Lets focus on the families, and on preventing such a useless loss of life from occuring anywhere ever again.

The president of the school should be held responsible and also the police department for neglecting to evacuate the students on campus. Those lives could have been saved if they acted accordingly!
Rich

You don't shut down 10 city blocks if there's a domestic shooting in an apartment because you expect the suspect to go shoot up a restaurant, the same way you don't shut down a 2,600 acre campus with thousands of students piling in. Because this is the type of thing that just doesn't happen.

Keep in mind that it was NOT a two hour notification lapse. The police didn't instantly know what was going on when they arrived in the dorm. They had to investigate and figure it out, like everybody else, and they were about to announce the FACTS--not rumors--after a calm and level-headed discussion. That happened to come two hours after they arrived on the scene, which is NOT necessarily two hours after they had the FACTS.

Or, you could let the police arrive at the dorm, freak out, spread rumors, tell students that there is a killer on the loose, watch thousands of students try to cram onto the Blacksburg Transit's 40-some odd buses, and deal with the panic.

You also can't send out 36,000 e-mails at the push of the Send button. It does take awhile. If you think about this for half a second you would realize this.

People, please use your brains. Support Steger, support the police department, support the University, and support the students. None of those that I have mentioned did anything grievously wrong on Monday morning.

All of you criticizing Steger, take note, if you say you would have done it differently, then you are lying - to yourself, and the public. They make decisions like this everyday, based on the information available at that time. A domestic dispute, even with two people killed, does not warrant shutting down a town of 25,000. That is essentially what VT is - a town of 25,000.

In honor of those that passed,any thoughts about retiring all VT athletic jerseys with the number 32?

I think we are all still trying to come to terms with the new world we live in especially the older generations. We don't want to believe that events like Oklahoma, Columbine and 9/11 could happen and with alarming and increasing frequency. As older Americans we're not use to it. I think with the changes in our society in the last 20 years or so, we've put on blinders. We want to believe this is the world we grew up in where these kind of incidences are rare and our children are basically safe. Unfortunately that's no longer true and the increased frequency of these events is a wake up call to our nation that we can no longer remain in the past and even the smallest of towns are no longer are immune from the changes going on in the world. I think the President and Blacksburg officials just got a painful wake up call and I pray that other cities and towns will take notice and prepare for the unthinkable.

How in the world would anyone have expected a "domestic dispute" to end up in the mass killing of 30 other innocent victims? The President of VT, the faculty and the students need our prayers and support. Forget the blame factor. What does that accomplish?

In the absence of any pertinent facts about the first tragedy that unfolded common sense should have led to notifying the campuse community of imminent danger; to guess that the "incident" is isolated strains credulity. Law enforcement, even in rural Virginia, could have done a better job.

I don't understand why he had students go to class as usual. Even with that move they could have protected the students within the room by at least locking the doors to the individual rooms. Why didn't they? H.S. isn't the same as college, but why didn't Steger at least advise the instructors to do something that simple. They didn't know if the shooter was a student or not, but even so...what if those classroom doors were locked...would those students be alive?

as a parent of a graduating senior I feel that the presidant did all he could with the time and info he had I truly support his decisions.

Shutting down a campus of that size is like shutting down a small town. It is very difficult, if not impossible, in a matter of a few short hours. It was also assumed at first that this was a domestic issue, which it is turning out to be- i.e. the shooter targeted a former romantic interest at first. There was no reason for the police or anyone to think that there was cause for alarm. If a guy in your town shoots his ex, you wouldn't expect the police to shut down the town, would you? President Steger did what he was supposed to do, as did the police chief. Any criticism of these individuals is misplaced.

Dr. Steger was the president of Virginia Tech when I was a graduate student there. I know him personally and I think he has done a great job during his tenure as Virginia Tech's president. I think it is extremely sad that some in the news media are trying to assign blame to Dr. Steger and the administration at Virginia Tech for this horrific tragedy which will forever tarnish the reputation of this fine university.

Rob Carlon
VPI class of '93 MS '01

I think it is the ultimate tragedy that so many have rushed to these forgone conclsusions about how the school handled this. It is quite understandable that people are devastated, but I think it is entirely too premature for us to be issuing indictments and pointing the finger. The school had no way of knowing that two-hours after the first incident that this mysterious assailant would turn up on the other side of a 2,000 acre campus, and shoot more people.

There is no way that campus police and officals could have anticipated the shooting in Norris based the information and timeframe they had to work with. There will no dobut be countless reviews of this tragedy, and we may learn there is more to we can do to prevent this from happening in the future. But myself and other Hokies stand together with the University as we deal with this extremely difficult time.

C. Cox
VT Alum, 2005

First, I would like offer my profound sympathy to the grieving families and to all those who were directly or indirectly impacted by this awful incident. Secondly, why do we continue to jump to conclusions without waiting for all the facts. Anyone who thinks that something different could have been done needs to rethink it. The shooter was a student. If you evacuated the campus, you would have evacuated the shooter. If you locked the campus down, who is to say that he still would not have attempted carry out his craziness and just randomly begin shooting anyone who was around or who did not get the message. Hindsight is 20/20. If there is anyone to blame, it is the shooter and the ONLY the shooter.