What's with all these shootings?

Valentine's Day 2008 - Gunman kills 5 and wounds 18 at Northern Illinois University.

Christmas Eve 2008 - Gunman dresses up as Santa Claus and kills 9 people, sets a booby trap for police and sets a fire.

March 10, 2009 - Gunman kills 10 people in three towns including his own mother and grandparents.

March 29, 2009 - Gunman walks into a rehab hospital and kills 7 patients and a nurse.

Today - An immigrant gunman walks into an immigrant training center, says nothing and starts shooting...killing 13 people.

These things happen in every corner of our country and it crosses economic and ethnic backgrounds. But why does this keep happening?

Can you blame the economy? Perhaps, but the sheer random violence of many of these killings is far beyond just being broke. Being broke may be a factor, but I can't see it as the prime motivation. These people had a heart to kill, period.

I know many non-Americans will point to the proliferation of guns in the United States. It's an easy and popular place to point the blame, but March 11th, a teen in Germany went into his former school and killed 15 people and last September a college student in Finland shot and killed 10 people. So this isn't a case of the American Wild West where everyone is packing a gun and only the crazies are shooting people.

But what's the reason? Or better yet, what's the answer? We seem to be caught in a tug of war. On one side is the gun owners and lobbyists...trying to protect our rights guaranteed under the 2nd Amendment. On the other side are the gun control activists...arguing for fewer guns and presumably a safer general public.

I don't necessarily buy either side in this argument. Yes, the Bill of Rights grants us the right to "bear arms". Now I'm all for that, but I have a hard time why anyone has the "right" or, better yet, the need to own assault weapons. Besides, even if you ban handguns, you won't be rid of them. People will just risk breaking the law to keep them...or the criminals will be the vast majority of gun owners.

With the recent news stories, today at work, I turned to Wayne and said "You know I'm being nice to you so that when you snap, you won't shoot me." Thankfully he said "Oh I won't kill you. I actually like you."

Thank heavens for small mercies...