Gun Violence Only in America?

All those oh so civilized Europeans clucking about gun violence in the United States in the wake of the Virginia Tech shooting must have bad memories.

Steve Stanek writing in Tech Central Station offers some perspective on our gun violence occurring in those "civilized" nations so critical of the United States.

Here are a few of the headlines I came across:

• "8 slain at council meeting"
• "Teen wounds 5 in tech school"
• "Suspected gang shooting leaves 4 dead, 2 injured"
• "Man kills ex-bosses, principal, himself"
• "Gunman kills self, 7 others"

The incidents these headlines describe occurred in France, the Netherlands, Japan, Germany and Italy, respectively. In the five years since that research, crime rates have continued to climb in many other countries with far stricter gun control laws than those in the United States.

And of course that fails to take into account the killing efficiency that European governments demonstrated so well during the 20th Century.

Should the U.S. be more like Europe? No thanks.