Two students murdered by a gunman at Brown University, nine others wounded, some seriously. Because America is not a civilized country, two other Brown students, who were not shot, witnessed the second mass shooting of their young lives.

Meanwhile, two attackers opened fired on a Hannukah celebration at Bondi Beach in Australia. Because Australia is a civilized country, the attackers had only rifles, not military grade weapons. The failure here was of policing: somehow the attackers were able to fire at civilians for 40 minutes (!) before being shot by police. (UPDATE: this is incorrect. Police shot the attackers after about ten minutes. It was another half hour before police confirmed that the surviving attacker was in custody.)

My sympathy to readers affected directly or indirectly by these grotesque events.