Oh, I understand, Bill - probably more than you realise.

But the frequency with which we hear the old bollocks about 'guns don't kill people', and 'self defence', and all the other horse-shit these people come out with, persuades me that they don't understand that the only reason they fell they 'need' guns is because they, and pretty well everybody else, have them.

Further up the thread, some gun-nut or other trying to be a clever-shit by bringing up football crowd problems, WW2, the Irish issues etc., as if that somehow justifies US gun-lunacy - the usual red-herrings that bullet-heads use to try to deflect the truth that allowing anyone and everyone to possess guns is the route to madness. The simple fact is that we have an average of 70 gun-deaths per annum with a population of 65 million. Pro-rata that to the U.S. population of 360 million, give or take, and you should have around 390 gun-deaths per annum, whereas you actually have c. 11,000.

We don't have guns to defend ourselves, but we're not being murdered in our thousands - we don't need guns because our government is man-enough to keep strong control on gun-ownership, so people aren't going around with a gun stuffed inside their jackets,mor leaving them lying around in their car's glove-box for the kids to find and shoot one another.

I understand the difficulty you have with the vast number of guns in circulation, and I don't underestimate the difficulties that people like you have in conducting a campaign for the reduction of gun-ownership, and stronger gun controls.

But understanding that doesn't mean that I can't express how appalled I am by the situation over there with respect to firearms, and express horror every time an incident like the one today takes place. And I do not understand the mentality of a nation that meekly accepts this kind of incident as some kind of 'collateral damage' just so that gun-loonies can keep their stupid bang-bangs.