Second Amendment, my ass

Naturally we all want to blame somebody - or something - for the senseless massacre at Virginia Tech. Maybe it was mental illness. Maybe it was his upbringing. Neglect. Too much violence on TV. Blah blah blah.

It was more than likely a combination of factors that led him to do this. Rarely does one act driven by only one motivation.

But the thing is - these motivations are commonplace. There are a lot of mentally ill young men. There are a lot of neglected kids. Lots of people watch, and internalize, TV violence. But these people don't trap innocent people in a building and start spraying them with bullets.

The point is, a lot of things have to happen to allow such a massacre to erupt. If certain things in this process didn't happen, then neither would the massacre.

Should not we, as a society, invest some time and energy into implementing ways to derail such nefarious trains before they reach their destination?

And that's gun control. No, make that a ban. The 2d Amendment was never meant to allow such a bloodbath. Yes we can blame a lot of other things. But "The president believes that there is a right for people to bear arms," deputy press secretary Dana Perino said. Then President Bush arrived at the lectern to decry the deaths of the students and their suspected gunman. As News & Observer columnist Barry Saunders wrote, "C'mon, dawg. The least you could've done was express condolences for the dead kids and their families first."

But we cling to the 2d Amendment, as if it could never be changed or limited. The rest of the world laughs at the 2d Amendment and the ridiculous gun lobby as a relic of a bygone era, kept alive by good ol' boy cash and consituting further proof that we Americans have absolutely no common sense. But then, neither do we Americans care what the rest of the world thinks of us. Just let us keep our guns, 'cos they go bang and it's cool.

Authorities found a $571 receipt for a 9mm glock, a firearm capable of rapid firing and able to deploy more than 10 bullets, purchased recently from a firearm store in Roanoke, Virginia. He had no criminal record, and he was legal. So he walked in and bought the gun. But you can't blame the storeowner. There is no way he could have known what the kid was plotting. But the system....ah....yes, you CAN blame the system. It killed 32 people.

Of all the reasons why Cho Seung-Hui did what he did, if he couldn't have gotten his hands on that $571 glock, then none of this....

What the hell. We have a constitutionally protected right to bear arms. It says so, in the 2d Amendment. It's for protection, oh, and recreational use.

I guess it's just too bad the 2d Amendment didn't protect the 32 victims of a clearly non-recreational user.

لاہور لاہور ہے

LAHORE, Va.

A Pakistani entrepreneur wants to transform a backwater town in central Virginia into a desi tourist draw, recreating Lahore. Lahore, Virginia. It sounds so weird on the tongue. Lahore, Virginia. Try to say it Punjabi style.....L'haaaaaaawr, Var-jeeee-niya. It gives new meaning to "لاہور لاہور ہے"

But if he pulls it off...I mean, whoever named that town, whoever that random store owner was....of all the cities in the world he could have picked to name his small Southern farming community...it couldn't be more perfect. Lahore is such a romantic city, ancient, full of history, charm...it is the undisputed cultural capital of Pakistan, and in many ways, all of South Asia. It holds a draw even to ABCD's like me (by the way, that stands for Amreeeeekan Born Cultured Desi" when applied to me) who've never lived there.

If he makes Lahore, Virginia into what he says, I mean, I will be there.

Where else could I get ras malai with my sweet tea?

Warning!! Fake Qur'ans! Don't Fall For The Dangerous Trick!

Recently another age-old circulating email made it into my inbox warning about the grave threat (or "dangerous trick") of a "new" fake Qur'an called Al Furqan al-Haqq. Moreover, this is being distributed in Kuwait, har dee har har.

I've been seeing this crap for quite a few years...actually now that I think about it, I was in law school when I first heard about it, meaning it's likely over 10 years old - hardly "new."

Anyway, the fact that the website you can read this fake Qur'an at is http://www.islam-exposed.org/furqan/contents.html should be indication enough. Why does anyone in their right mind think that this actually poses a threat? You might fall off your chair laughing at it when you read it, and you could bump your head, maybe. But if a Muslim who reads this suddenly renounces Islam, exclaiming in ecstasy that he has truly found the Haqq, then chances are the book had very little to do with his sudden conversion. He was either 99% of the way there already, "there" being defined as a) apostasy, or b) a paagal khana.

Actually this "book" is a compilation of anti-Islamic diatribes authored by Anis Shorrosh, an Arab Christian made famous in the Muslim world by his videotaped debates with Ahmed Deedat. Apparently he took on the challenge in Quran 2:23 (And if ye are in doubt as to what We have revealed from time to time to Our servant, then produce a Sura like thereunto; and call your witnesses or helpers (If there are any) besides Allah, if your (doubts) are true) and, by all accounts, failed miserably.

Anyway visit the link. It's quite comical. Eg, Surah 2, entitled "The Basmalah," verse 2, which reads:

"He is Triune in Unity, united in Trinity, indivisible as deity."

ہیں؟ كی آكھیا ؟میں سمجھیا نہیں