Everyone agrees, the shootings at Northern Illinois University's Cole Hall were dreadful and yes, we need to react, but not by tearing down a much-needed building.

To do so is such a knee-jerk reaction by our incompetent state politicians and not the answer - at a $40 million price tag no less.

If Northern wants to create a memorial to honor the victims that is wonderful, but have them do so with private donations and other non-public funding. I don't recall any such recommendations made at Virginia Tech with the building of their horrendous shootings. I don't recall any attempt to tear up and reroute the Chicago-area Metra commuter rail track when the 1995 Fox River Grove school bus accident killed seven students.

And of course, there were very few politicians during the Vietnam crisis demanding the shooting to stop because one of their friends had been killed in action.

Bad things happen and politicians have to stop chasing the ambulance - attempting to sensationalize some dreadful public incident for their own political image.

If the public and our politicians truly want to do something to acknowledge this horrible event, they should look more toward enforcing our current gun laws and implementing more meaningful gun control. You could honor the victims at NIU and their families in no better way.

Jim Wilson

Bloomington