More specifically Toadfrog, this incident took place in that part of Germany where there was no unemployment until the wall came down. Where they looked on the liberated west as Utopia, only to discover it was a sick joke. Now they've got massive unemployment, grinding poverty and rich kids flaunting ill-gained wealth under their noses.

That said, the reason in the present outrage seems to be more to do with a personal hang-up than any social iniquity. But Ebbie, whatever the reason, the availability of guns has got everything to do with it.

There may be legal constraints on ownership this side of the duckpond, but they are hard to apply, with AK47s and the rest flooding in from points east. The land borders are a big factor - there are proportionately many more guns in middle Europe than there ever were in Ireland at the height of the troubles. (Had there been more guns in Ireland, many more people would have died. I get the impression that some contributors in this thread would think that was a reasonable trade-off for the right to bear arms.)

Mick, my issue is not with gun control but gun production. And here I am as disgusted with the UK as with the USA. We flood the world with arms and couldn't care less where they finish up. Where they start is bad enough - Indonesia during its assault on East Timor, for instance, Iraq in its spat with Iran and the Kurds. Even the Saudi dictatorship (Uncle Sam drew the line at that one.) Not to mention arming all the countries, on all sides, that got involved in fighting over the remains of the DRC (Congo). In British Aerospace (BAe Systems - the side-arms to missiles outfit) we have the the world's biggest arms supplier. All with a government that promised an ethical foreign policy.

Watch news footage from Sierra Leone, Afghanistan or any other of the poorest countries on earth (OK, not you WYSIWYG). The kids may be starving, but they're not short on phenomenal firepower. We live in a world where death is easy, and Britain and the USA have led the way in creating it.