This is sad....
and with the gunman dead, the reason may never be know....
but he/she has been rehabilitated....
pity this had to happen at all...wonder what goes through peoples heads that drives them to this end......

It will happen again. Just change the number of killed. Change the location. Pass a law? Ho hum. Have read it before, will read it again. And I/we should do what?

The United States of America is a very troubled country, beset by an ever mounting number of external and internal problems.

Most of these problems are self-created and self-inflicted.

Nobody can help them because they will not take any advise on anything from the international community and institutions.

One can only feel very sorry for the individual victims of these troublesome times and circumstances.

The future may bring more and bigger problems if there is no change in attitudes.

"The United States of America is a very troubled country, beset by an ever mounting number of external and internal problems."

Just to put things into context .... the USA has 10 times as many people as Canada ... so 30+ killed there is in the same ratio as 3+ killed here.

The other way to look at it is the frequency of incidents, for every 10 incidents there, we can expect 1 incident here.

We must not forget about the fellow in Lethbridge a few years ago ... then the one in Montreal ... then the one previous to that in Montreal dealing with 7 women targeted as it happens in an engineering faculty.

Then there was the case of a government worker in Kamloops a few years ago ....

I think that the USA, rate wise, is more violent, but how much more when it comes such incidents I really do not know.

Sorry, that was 14 females in Montreal ….

Sept. 13, 2006: A gunman opens fire at Dawson College in Montreal. At least 12 people are injured.

April 20, 2000: Four students and one staff member wounded in knife attack at Cairine Wilson High School in Orleans, Ont. Occurs on first anniversary of Columbine massacre.

April 28, 1999: 14-year-old boy shoots two students, one fatally, at W.R. Myers High School in Taber, Alta.

Feb. 8, 1999: Man fires shot at Woodland Elementary School in Verdun, Que. No one injured.

October 1997: 35-year-old man fatally shoots teacher at Montreal language school for immigrants.

October 1994: Two guidance counsellors at Brockton High School in Toronto shot and wounded by student unhappy with grades.

June 1993: Teen wounded outside Gladstone Secondary School in Vancouver in drive-by shooting.

Aug. 24, 1992: Valery Fabrikant, professor at Concordia University in Montreal, goes on shooting rampage at school, killing four colleagues and wounding one.

February 1990: Jilted teenager shoots and wounds estranged girlfriend at General Brock High School in Burlington, Ont.

December 1989: Marc Lepine, 25, shoots dead 14 women at University of Montreal's Ecole polytechnique engineering school, then kills himself.

October 1978: 17-year-old student shoots 16-year-old to death at Sturgeon Creek Regional Secondary School in Winnipeg.

May 1975: Michael Slobodian, 16, kills teacher and student and wounds 13 others at Centennial Secondary School in Brampton, Ont., before turning gun on himself.

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20060913/violence_timeline_060913/20060913

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"The United States of America is a very troubled country, beset by an ever mounting number of external and internal problems.

Most of these problems are self-created and self-inflicted.

Nobody can help them because they will not take any advise on anything from the international community and institutions."
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The problems the United States faces are unrelated to the random murderous acts of a deranged madman. While certainly much of the domestic violence in the US is related to a greater social dysfunction, American society doesn't create a sick individual with the intent to massacre a college campus. No, this is an anomalous event expected to occur on occasion in any community of 300 million people whose core characterization is that they are all from different parts of the world to begin with. Just considering the spectrum of personality types that must be represented in a population that large, the fact that these events don't occur more frequently is an amazing testament to the general stability of American social structure. Today's events are one of the expected risks that goes along with living in a society as open and free as the US. While Americans mourn when it happens, it is widely acknowledged and accepted as a fact of living there (something most wouldn't trade for anything).

I can't imagine what advice the world community has offered the United States that could have prevented this morning's tragedy had it been heeded. This is nothing more than a crazy man killing innocent students.

OK, Owl, you made your point.And, you are obviously talented at researching such items. But where would you rather live, here? or or in the states? I agree with diplomat. That's one reader's opinion.
metalman.

"This is nothing more than a crazy man killing innocent students."

It certainly is a simplification to imply that individuals such as the ones that commit crimes like that were living totally isolated from the (often violent, bad) influences of society as a whole.

The world community for instance deplores certain acts of international violence.

I'll say no more than that.

I wish there were no guns.

Simplistic but that is how I feel

I know there are other ways to kill but guns are so fast and so impersonal.

Every one can opine and delude themselves. Silly geese !! There aint no answer.

This is another example of why law abiding citizens in the USA must get concealed weapons permits. If a law abiding citizen would have been carrying a gun there would not be 33 innocent dead humans right now. People need to arm themselves so nuts like this don't get away with taking innocent lives. In cases like this the police can only react they can’t prevent it from happening. Only an armed citizen would have kept this from happening.

This is another example of why law abiding citizens in the USA must get concealed weapons permits. If a law abiding citizen would have been carrying a gun there would not be 33 innocent dead humans right now. People need to arm themselves so nuts like this don't get away with taking innocent lives. In cases like this the police can only react they can’t prevent it from happening. Only an armed citizen would have kept this from happening.

This is another example of why law abiding citizens in the USA must get concealed weapons permits. If a law abiding citizen would have been carrying a gun there would not be 33 innocent dead humans right now. People need to arm themselves so nuts like this don't get away with taking innocent lives. In cases like this the police can only react they can’t prevent it from happening. Only an armed citizen would have kept this from happening.

Does yer spouse know you talk in threes? Annoying.

oh man that was funny... Thanks for the great laugh Harbanger.

Talking in three's is ok, along as when it is time to shoot you hit three times. I'd pack a gun if I was allowed. People are so polite and civil.

Too much blaming the guns and gun laws and not enough blame on the person/persons or circumstances involved.
I grew up with guns.Many of us here in Canada did.Handguns and long guns.Was it a different world then? Now that I no longer hunt,trap,or target shoot,I no longer have any guns.If that changed,I would buy more.Hopefully,I still can.
There have been situations in my travels in the U.S.that I might have felt more comfortable having a gun.
Why?
Because everybody else had one.In their vehicle or on their person.Weird but true.If they are going to start shooting,I would perfer to have a gun too.Self defense and you don't take a rat-tailed comb to a gun fight.Spend some time in places like Montana,Wyoming,or even Texas and you may be very suprised by the number of handguns being packed around.Even if you don't always see them,they are there.As a matter of fact,I only assume it is legal to carry in those places, but I have never actually checked.
I don't care.
Fortunately,they don't go around shooting each other anymore than anywhere else.
At least not where I was.
I think the adversion to prison and lethal injection deters that for the most part.And the majority are law abiding citizens.
So,I would have to say it is the idiots and mental midgets holding the guns,not the guns themselves.
So lets stop hollering about "gun control".It wouldn't have made one damn bit of difference in this case!
(Ok owl....you can rip THAT one apart!)

Rip apart? How about *google apart*? :-)

I see today that my theory on art students holds up once again. Its always the arts students that go crazy when they can't handle the altered reality and mind washing of the arts programs. Turns out this nut case in Virginia was low and behold an English creative arts student. Big surprise there. Give a disillusioned arts student a gun and you have a disaster in the making.