Gun debates again

The carnage at Virginia Tech is horrifying; I have no idea what, if anything, might prevent further such horrors. So I haven't weighed in with helpful suggestions from a continent away.

For all the ties of history and values, there are certain aspects of American culture that even Atlanticist Europeans find difficult to adjust to. These include attitudes to violence within national borders - notably gun control and the death penalty. I am with the pointy-headed, liberal, European sophisticates on these issues. But I don't necessarily assume that the type of society I prefer is one in which lone misfits with mass murder on their minds would be thwarted in that aim. There is something futile, if not indecent, in Europeans offering sage advice on this point - especially those of us in a city where half a dozen youngsters have been shot or knifed to death in well publicised cases in recent weeks. Common sense on this point comes from Magnus Linklater in The Times:

Would gun control in America have prevented the carnage at Virginia Tech university? Probably, yes. Does that mean that tighter controls will reduce gun crime? Almost certainly, not. That, simply put, is the dilemma that confronts us each time we listen to the grim, but all too familiar, details of a school or college massacre, the planned, methodical preparations for an apparently deranged act of revenge, the shock experienced by a small and peaceful community and the soul-searching that comes in its aftermath.