What a cop out. Yes, everyone is reacting, as they did after 9-11. But significant changes came out of that massacre, and significant changes should come from this as well.  I don't know if it's the time of year, the location, or the scope of the event itself, but the pat excuses don't seem to be cutting it this time. We have a re-elected President, a new Congress, and a rising tide of public, moral outrage. Even the NRA appears to be reading the tea leaves. This isn't about gun rights; it's about common sense.

We know we can't abolish evil. We CAN take steps to increase human safety. 

There are many ways in which change can be enacted to reduce the risk of this type of mass murder. Tougher gun laws clearly could have made this less likely to happen. But also, having a father in the home may have prevented this. This kid was video game junkie-so strict laws in video gaming may have played a role.

Yes, let's all sit back and do nothing about this issue, it's just the way it goes here in America. Absurd column.

Hello Jeff, We generally like people who care for others and engender a sense of community among us all, but we never seem to really want to pay for these things.  The government has largely relingquished is responsibilities in the areas of mental illness and community organization.  We are a transient society and, unfortunately, highly tribal - "I'll associate with folks that think like me because all others are strange and/or evil."  Politics only accentuates this divide by dividing and conquering, ie the 1%, 99%, 47%, Muslims are bad, Mormons are bad, Christians are bad...we do not really advocate the fact that we are all in this together because it goes against specific interests - guns, education, taxes, faith - we all have.  We are individualistic and care too much about "winning" over others rather than getting along.  Take care!

Yes.  Cultivate human goodness... and take away their guns.

Well I will give Jeff credit.  He was creative enough to turn stating the obvious into a column.  Accomplishing that he was able to meet his contractual obligation for the week.  Outside of that he said absolutely nothing.

"Good laws never abolish evil."  There you have it folks Jeff has told you something you never realized.  He has opened the conversation with a glaring sign stating the obvious.  I'm not even sure how folks are getting into a debate on this.  Oh wait, the comments are more interesting than the article. 

I think most folks know you can't abolish evil any more than you can legislate against really bad articles.

It is easy for everyone to assign their cause as the reason this tragedy occurred, but the reality is that unless Adam Lanza were alive to confess or left some manifesto of his need to take the lives he did, everything is simply conjecture. There is probably more than one reason for this crime to have been committed and probably they all were viewed as isolated issues. Had they been seen as the whole of the individual, then someone may have recognized that there was a serious problem brewing. But again, people are becoming so narrowly focused on THEIR issues, co-existence of issues is unfathomable. As much of an impact that the Internet has had on the world, the World is not digital, made up of ones and zeroes, either on or off, yes or no, up or down.  The thing that makes the World special is the variety and differences and how these come together to make something completely different, yet familiar. Only when the isolationist view of the world can be tempered with the reality of the co-mingling of perspectives will the World take a step forward in diminishing the senseless violence being enacted upon others.

Do a Google Images search for the Bushmaster .223 Here's one: nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2012/12/major-gun-maker-to-be-sold.html And in related news everyone can just calm the blank down. It's not an assault weapon people, it just looks a little like one. According to Michael Graham, who said so yesterday. So, guns are still good, nothing to see here, move along.

It's the capacity to inflict pain on other human beings that can't be eliminated. All the other suggestions that the author lists are the ones that need to be considered. Maybe a combination of all or some of them will curb the appetite for evil of the human race. 

Jeff you moron: the nation needs to take its cue from other countries, such as the UK, which with its laws only TEN people last year were murdered by guns, as opposed to the US' 10,000 plus. Of course evil will always be with us, but mass murder, the way it takes place here, can definitely be curbed by gtting tougher on assault weapons. Perhaps the NRA has you by the short and curlies, too.

I agree Jeff, let's just ignore this and concentrate on making more white babies. After all, you can always make more right? But only the good kind-no more bad ones. How simple was that?

Americans have grown into cocky experts on everything. Just what is an American in 2012? We are either sheep-like, or completely divided. We are combative, gluttonous, and carry a narrow view of the world. We are highly critical and reactionary. We are no longer united; and so it goes..."divided we fall". Babies, American babies have died here--in America by an American. Terrifying, but not terrorism. Perhaps not even hate but sickness and total distortion of life and rights of others to live. How basic is that? This reality, this tragedy is the worst imaginable. If this tragedy does not give every American pause to reflect, to be thoughtfully sorrowed, to be humble for a time to recognized this tragedy for what it is...then we have the answer of what an American is and it does no American proud. Peace.

I overhead someone I know with very strong libertarian views say in a conversation over the weekend that you can't legislate away harm. Such an Alfred E. Neumanish, devil-may-care embrace of small government is small-minded. Do you have a solution - either comprehensive or singular in nature? I look forward to your further treatises on the "cultivation of human goodness"? 

Jeff Jacoby is the Skip Bayliss of the Boston Globe.

Ok Jeff, you've finally hit the bottom with this one. Save for the main assertion - that nothing we do will result in the end of 'evil'- the rest of this article is a lazy collection of quotes masquerading as thoughtful reflection. None of the quoted were responding to whether or not we could 'get rid of evil'(except maybe Huckabee), they were offering up opinions on things we could do that would help. Your link in support of the notion that mass shootings aren't becoming more prevalent is pretty weak too(one quote from a Northeastern U. expert making that flat assertion with no relevant supporting detail). I think it's pretty clear that as a society we've abdicated on controlling firearms and offering support for those with mental illness and that these mass shootings will continue until we address these issues.

This article is stunningly irresponsible.  "Can't we all just get along?"  Part of being an evolved and thoughtful society is realizing that we can and do affect good and evil in our midst.  Gun control and the care of our mentally ill are front and center in this endeavor.  Violent computer games?  Let's have parents step up and be real parents.

There wil be a hue and cry for stricter gun control.  Congress will hold hearings in 2013, a little more time will go by and nothing, nothing will change.

The NRA has a chance to take a resposible position and lead here.  They can create an agenda to eliminate large clips of bullets, they can lead with a position to eliminate weapons with the capability of rapid automatic fire.  No one needs weapons like this for hunting, target shooting, or even self-defense.  The liberals cannot do this, but the gun people can.

Let's at least try to take the "mass" out of mass murder.

"Nightmares like the one in Newtown are rare." Not rare enough. Not nearly.

What a seriously worthless article. This writer disdains the very notion of even attempting any change of the status quo. Inaction is his solution! With a grand climax of a self-reverential article of his very own: "The cultivation of human goodness", of course! Oh what a wise and humble man to have come up with such a philosophy. Never try to change anything, it's just the way things are. Don't be naive. Oh vey what can you do. And here I thought that "good laws" would abolish every last scrap of evil in the world. My advice to JJ's children- as soon as you're old enough, get out of the house as often as you can.

blind Hollywood:

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/movies/moviesnow/la-et-mn-connecticut-shooting-samuel-jackson-gun-control-20121216,0,2690925.story

I agree laws alone won't fix things. But laws should reflect a consensus about what tradeoffs we are willing to make in our society. Laws set the initial conditions and influence behavior. When those laws are out of sync with the values in our culture then the law needs to be changed or it will continue to support the status quo.

Would an assualt weapons ban have prevented these tragedies? We can never know. But what we do know is that it is easy and lawful for a suburban mom to acquire military style weapons and a massive arsenal of bullets designed to impact maximum damage. When the only answer to "why did she have those weapons?" is "because she could!" or "none of your business, it's her 2nd Amendment right!" I think the law needs to change. What is different today from a week ago is I believe the majority of people in America--while they might not agree on gun control specifics--would agree that something is wrong with the scenario above and we ARE NOT POWERLESS to change the preconditions that make it possible.