METHODS TO FIGHT THIS MADNESS

Philadelphia Inquirer: Another workaday morning, another kid from a troubled home gets his hands on a gun, another school becomes a killing ground.
Just a year since a 6-year-old killed a classmate in a Michigan elementary school, and within weeks of the two-year anniversary of the Columbine High School slayings in Colorado, another community has taken a too-familiar crash course: gun violence in school.
The rest of America needs to wonder out loud when, if ever, we will learn the lessons.
Mourning those killed in the San Diego suburb of Santee -- students Bryan Zuckor and Randy Gordon -- is the first imperative. Police say they were random victims of a 15-year-old classmate, Charles Andrew Williams, who fatally shot the boys and wounded 13 others Monday.
But grief alone hardly is a sufficient response -- indeed, it's barely enough to earn a passing grade in this course.
While there are no easy answers to the question of how to prevent these shootings, it's hardly a brain-buster to conclude that we need stronger families and more watchful school authorities.
Bush bromide: Here's hoping that, upon further reflection, President Bush will offer more than the bromide that "all adults ... can teach children right from wrong, can explain that life is precious." Same holds for his revelation that, pretty much no matter what we do as a society, "some people may decide to act out their own aggressions."
These have become textbook killings, to the extent that they fit disturbing patterns. We can study them, and learn. Or we can sit around and pine for another time -- when family life was less chaotic, when "My Three Sons" were not aspiring gangsta-rappers, when other social woes were fewer.
Here's the outline of teen trouble: There's often a youthful score to be settled, real or imagined. There's a verbal threat shared among friends -- sometimes ignored as a joke. And, of course, there's access to a loaded weapon.
Each aspect of this core curriculum suggests a clear response. Among them:
UDon't downsize the school guidance department. Teens who invariably view problems through a magnifying glass need to talk -- to parents first, but with a network of caring adults as a backup.
UBuild an early warning system among kids. The old stop-drop-and-roll fire practice might have to be supplemented by drills in ratting-out-your-threat-making-friends -- for their own good.
UNot only keep guns under lock and key, but punish adult owners who fail to do so. And press ahead with childproof weapon designs like those under review by gun maker Smith & amp; Wesson.
The nation already is too-well-schooled in this grim subject.
A MISSILE REALITY CHECK
Los Angeles Times: The Bush administration and Congress are being reminded that a highly complex system like the proposed national missile shield can't simply be willed into existence. The General Accounting Office reports that a key element of the program, an infrared surveillance satellite network to detect incoming warheads and provide data to track and destroy them, is unlikely to be ready on schedule or perform as intended. The Space-Based Infrared System Low, as the satellite system is called, is the eyes of the expanded anti-missile defense that President Bush wants. At a minimum, the timetable for proceeding with missile defense demands revision.
This isn't the first time that technical progress has failed to keep pace with strategic goals, and it surely won't be the last. The message sent by the GAO, the nonpartisan investigative arm of Congress, is that it could be extremely wasteful as well as militarily futile to rush into a program where formidable obstacles remain to be overcome. The Air Force plans to begin launching the first of 24 satellites in 2006, with all in place by 2010. To meet that arbitrary deadline the Air Force chose to start building the satellites before development work on them has been completed. That approach, the GAO warns, would commit the Air Force to purchasing costly parts that might never be used if design changes make them unneeded or obsolete, as so often happens.
Essential technologies: Moreover, reports the GAO, the software the system requires won't be completed until three years after the first satellites are launched. In fact, five of the six essential technologies the system depends on might not be ready when needed.
Rep. Jerry Lewis, R-Calif., chairman of the House Appropriations defense subcommittee, has voiced "grave concern" about the GAO report.
Early hearings on the weaknesses of the proposed missile defense system are clearly needed. The folly of rushing into a hugely expensive program whose key elements have yet to be developed, definitively tested and shown to be effective is apparent. The timetable for building a National Missile Defense system should be driven not by political considerations but by the practical dictates of the technologies needed to make NMD work. The schedule should take full account of these technical realities.