The late John F. Kennedy once rightly ridiculed those on BOTH the Right and Left with their policies of despair- "suicide or surrender, humilation or holocaust".

The recent response by either extreme to the slaughter of civilians by (so-called) Islamic State terrorists( no "gunmen" or "militants"- let's call them what they are- "terrorists"!) in Paris in the aftermath of the drone killing of "JIhadi John" makes me wonder if either side has learned anything from the Cold War.

Predictably enough The Stop The War Coalition blamed the slaughter on French bombing of Syria( it later had the grace to take down this post a few hours later) whilst Newt Gingrich( who much like Dick "Lon "Cheney , Rush Limbaugh and other "chickenhawks" NEVER saw a war he didn;t want to send SOMEONE ELSE'S son or daughter to fight or die in) made the nonsensical claim that if the revellers at the rock concert and diners at the restaurant had been carrying concealed weapons then the slaughter could and would have been avoided- a claim that French TV rightly ridiculed- France, like most EU member nations has tough gun control legislation and if simply possessing guns, concealed or otherwise , made for a safer society, then Southern states such as Texas, Louisiana, Mississippi or Alabama would have markedly lower rates of murder and other violent crimes than their Northern counterparts such as New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania et al. By the way, Newt- no WHO'S using a tragedy to advance a partisan agenda!

Terry