© PASCAL ROSSIGNOL/REUTERS
Will 2016 go down as one of the worst years in history? A glance at the news might make you think so.
Last week's
grotesque murder of the 85-year-old Normandy priest, Father Jacques Hamel, came hard on the heels of
the Nice massacre a fortnight ago. In France alone, nearly 250 people have been killed by terrorists over the last year and a half - more than the total number of French civilians killed by terrorists over the entire 20th century.
The fear after the terror is great, too. In Cannes, that byword for free and easy French Riviera living, authorities last week
banned any beach bags big enough to conceal a weapon.
And that's just France.
Add in Germany - which has seen an axe attack, a teenager on a mad shooting spree, a vicious knifing and a suicide bombing, which left 13 dead, including three attackers, and dozens wounded.
Then there's Turkey, where the failed coup a fortnight ago left more than 300 people dead and more than 2,100 injured. And that was less than three weeks after three suicide bombers hit Istanbul Ataturk Airport, killing 41 and injuring more than 230.
The list goes on:
police killing civilians in America, civilians killing police; the mass bloodbaths of Syria and Iraq; the Zika virus devastating Brazil, just before the Rio Olympics.
Comment: There doesn't have to be a crime. There doesn't have to be a reason. There only has to be a trigger-happy cop and a corrupt justice system.