US sniper obession
British media wonders what is going on here.
The United States will hold elections in two weeks. President George W Bush might have changed his position on whether regime change is necessary in Iraq. And there have been new nuclear revelations about North Korea, a member of the Mr Bush’s dreaded “axis of evil”.
But all of these stories are buried under a mountain of US coverage of the serial sniper in the Washington region.
Steve Lopez of the LA Times points out this morning, this isn’t new – some people in the US deal with snipers and shootings as part of their daily life.
In another story in the Times today an immigrant from Liberia said
“In my country it was war and shooting every day, and every day an uprising,” he said. “Nobody knows who’s next. As we’re standing out here, we could be shot. You have to live your life.”
If the sniper stays on the run much longer, Richards said, his neighbors will get used to the dread. They will assimilate. “They’ll get tired of it,” he said. “They may be frightened today, but eventually they will have to come out again.”
Oh, this just in, Washington sniper not God, FBI confirms