One failed law is just the predicate for the next one.
WINNENDEN, Germany — A teenage gunman killed 15 people, most of them female, on Wednesday in a rampage that began at a school near Stuttgart in southern Germany and ended in a nearby town, where he then killed himself after the police wounded him.
The attack left Germany, which tightened tough gun controls after a similar attack at a school seven years ago, struggling to understand the carnage that had again befallen it, a country with relatively little violent crime. In 2002, a gunman killed 16 people before killing himself at a school in Erfurt, in eastern Germany.
They had tough gun laws; they had a school shooting. They tightened those tough gun laws; they had another school shooting.
To state the obvious: A man intent on mass murder is not deterred by misdemeanor level possession/purchase laws. He's bound for prison or death by cop; he is not sweating the lesser laws he may break en route to a massive slaughter of children.
Of course he dressed in black, too. That's part of the fantasy.
They said the attacker, clad in black, opened fire in three classrooms at the school, killing nine students — eight girls and a boy — and three teachers, all women. Seven wounded students were hospitalized.
Strict gun laws, loose gun laws: An intensely motivated lunatic is going to find a way to make his fantasy real.