On the response

I've gotten some feedback on it, and reading this story offers some additional perspective, but I've still got some concerns regarding the delay of the University of Georgia's alert system in the wake of George Zinkhan's shooting spree.

Perhaps I'm not understanding what the alert system is designed to do, but it does seem to me that 90 minutes is a rather distinctive amount of time to let lapse between the actual shooting and the official warning going out to the UGA community. If the system, as I understand it, was set up to provide quick alerts to avoid the nighmarish scenario that unfolded at Virginia Tech a few years back ... then I'm just struggling to see how letting an hour and a half lapse before it goes out is fulfilling its objective.

But beyond that, quite frankly, I haven't been awfully impressed by the response of the Athens-Clarke County police. Zinkhan was, for all practical purposes, given an hour's headstart on the authorities while they obsessively focused on the red jeep. Clarence Holeman, at times, has engaged in what appears to be wild speculation during his press briefings, and the UGA Police and Athens-Clarke County police have offered conflicting messages (i.e. ACC says Zinkhan's gone and there's no need to worry, while UGA has armed guards patrolling the campus).

I understand how chaotic this whole thing is, and I'm sympathetic to the intense focus and scrutiny that has come with the national media attention, but the initial response seems to be somewhat disjointed.