The murders at Virginia Tech were part of a calculated plan by one crazed gunman wanting to send a message to the people he felt had wronged him and others. His motives became very clear from contents of the package he mailed to NBC’s New York headquarters in the middle of his killing spree. He says he will “die like Jesus Christ” and refers to “martyrs like Eric and Dylan,” thought to be the Columbine killers.

A troubling aspect of this latest massacre, labeled “the deadliest one-man shooting rampage in modern U.S. history,” is that it sets a new, higher mark for anyone else seeking to bring notoriety to themselves. It is the new “record to beat.” 

In Cho’s package to NBC he says “I die like Jesus Christ, to inspire generations of the weak and the defenseless people.” Inspire them to kill? Very troubling are postings on blogs and sites including YouTube and MySpace calling Cho a hero and saying that his actions were justified. How many more massacres will Cho’s inspire? How many more innocent victims will die?

According to a new report by the Food and Drug Administration, a chemical that caused the initial recall of dog and cat food has shown up in a second ingredient prompting more pet foods to be added to the recall list. The complete details are on the FDA website.

According to research sponsored by the Aviation Institute at the University of Nebraska and Wichita State University, more bags are lost, there are fewer on-time flights, and more passengers are being bumped from flights. That’s the bad news.

The good news is that the number of complaints have stabilized since 2005.

More bad news is that the airline industry, according to a spokeman for the Airline Transport Association, expects more delays, lost bags, cancellations, and unhappy passengers.

Unfortunately for those of us who need to travel great distances in a fairly short amount of time, there aren’t any other options that will get us from Point A to Point B as quickly as flying, assuming our flight isn’t cancelled or we aren’t bumped due to overbooking.