Don't Fear The Hacker

Now that the Predator has been elected Governor, surely Mickey Kaus has something to live for. Yet Kaus makes this creepy confession in his blog:

A second NYU student has died after jumping off the 10th floor blacony of the Bobst Library's dramatic internal atrium. When I lived in New York, I was terrified of using Bobst for just this reason--fear of succumbing to the urge to jump (or worrying that others would succumb). It's now clear that this isn't just an eccentric phobia--the space is an invitation to suicide, a form of architectural malpractice. To construct such a space on a college campus filled with moody and inebriated kids seems particularly negligent. It's all the more inexcusable because there's a model for a skylit atrium that doesn't create such risks--the historic Bradbury building in Los Angeles....

I hate to tell Mick this, but there are probably 70 million places -- bridges, windows, balconies, roofs, etc. -- in New York City from which a person could jump to his or her death. And many more ways to kill yourself without jumping. Closing down structures that Kaus is afraid of is not the way to lower the suicide rate. Certainly a man so enamored of "tort reformers" like the Predator and Bush would never endorse litigation against architects who fail to make their buildings suicide-proof.

And Mick reveals his fear of "blacony"s -- is that a Kausian slip?