I am really, really, envious of John Derbyshire.

He has just has won the "Worst Person In The World" award from Keith Olbermann for saying, as Michelle Malkin did last night, that the dead students should have fought back. [Video]

I've been saying that for some time, Kathy Shaidle has been saying it for years, the late Sam Francis said it.

Why can't we win prizes like this? All we get are annoying diatribes from David Brock.

Runners up for "Worst Person" include Nathanael Blake, of Human Events, for agreeing with Derbyshire and Debbie Schlussel for saying "Remember that the next time you hear President Bush and Condi Clueless waxing lyrical about how we need more foreign students in America."

The technical name for not fighting back is "cowardice." One professor died bravely, giving his life in order to door protect his students. That's courage, and he should be awarded some kind of medal. But compare it to the behavior in this email Michelle Malkin received:

We heard pretty much continuous shooting for the next minute or so, and I said, "Shouldn't we barricade the door," because we were sitting ducks with no way out inside that room if he opened the door. A couple more people floated the idea that "We need to barricade the door, NOW." But I was too scared to even move, much less move the teacher's desk.

Finally one of the guys in the front of the classroom was brave enough to get up and move the desk in front of the door to prevent outside entry. About twenty seconds later, the shooter rattled the doorknob trying to get in. When he couldn't get in he fired two shots through the door (single solid piece of wood) and left. We heard him go in to 206 (the room across the hall) and shoot the people in that room. If we hadn't put the barricade up when we did, I and all my classmates would be dead. [Michelle Malkin: Carnage at Virginia Tech;Readers point to campus ban on self-defense;|More video, plus student e-mail]

This is cowardice, and the student in question, (I won't name him) should receive some kind of non-medal.

It starts with him being too terrified to move, even to barricade the door, the a different, slightly braver student barricades the door, which later in the email becomes "if we hadn't put the barricade up when we did" and they are all happy to hear the gunman go away and kill some other students.

And here's another point: the professor I mentioned, Liviu Librescu, 76, died protecting a bunch of young men and women of military age who were bravely, bravely, bravely, running away.

Somehow, that doesn't compute. Perhaps it was because he was born before the modern age of cowardice.

By the way, it usual when a writer, (such as myself, or John Derbyshire) blogs about some public display of cowardice, to send him ranting emails accusing him of chickenhawkery, and asking "What would you do...?" All such emails will be ignored unless accompanied by a credible challenge to an actual duel.