It appears the “Ishmael” persona was clearly important to this sicko, since he used it as the return address on his mailing to NBC and was reported to have written “Ismail Ax” or “Ismael Ax” on his arm in red ink before committing his act. I have also read that it was his gamer ID on XBox Live, but have yet to see this point reported in the MSM.
I agree that the Ishmael literary possibility based on the Biblical allusion is interesting speculation:
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1819538/posts?page=910#910
This shows up both in Melville and in a book by an idiot named Quinn in which he uses a telepathic ape named Ishmael to spout leftist envirowacky drivel, around which I gather a mini-cult has developed (which is discussed by various posters in this thread), as well as other writers of course.
I didn't know about the other literary reference to the ape, though. Very interesting.
His roomates said he never played video games. Ismail is likely a muslim connection in his head at least.
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