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Barton did not fit into that category, although, during the custody hearings for Barton's (now-dead) children in 1993, a district attorney who reviewed Barton's psychological tests said that the results "to this day make me shudder."

Handgun Control Inc.'s Sarah Brady pointed out, however, that a Connecticut law that will go into effect Oct. 1 will give law enforcement the right -- under stringent conditions -- to remove guns from the homes of those who are deemed a significant threat to the community.

Such a law would seem to have little chance of passing either the House or the Senate in the current political climate, where members of Congress, according to Lewis, "are hostage to the NRA."

Comparing Barton to other shooters known in their neighborhoods as more than a bit unstable -- like Matthew Beck in Connecticut, Carl Drega in New Hampshire, Di-Kieu Duy in Utah, Gian Luigi Ferri in California and Russell Weston in Washington, D.C. -- Brady said that like them, "Barton was a walking time bomb, and at least some people, prior to the shootings, recognized that fact."

Barton's rampage seems to have been preceded by at least one homicidal rage that didn't involve guns. His first wife and mother-in-law were hacked to death in an Alabama trailer park by a knife that police were never able to locate. And before Thursday's shootings, Barton appears to have bludgeoned to death both of his kids from that first marriage, 7-year-old Elizabeth Mychelle, or "Shelly," and 12-year-old Matthew, as well as his second wife, Leigh Ann, 27, in his Stockbridge, Ga., apartment.

That's three, or possibly five, notches on Barton's belt before a gun necessarily even fell into his hand. Though, of course, the luxury of distance and rapid fire that guns provide for homicidal maniacs can't be beat by knives or blunt instruments. Hence, Barton was easily able to kill nine people and wound 12 others in two Atlanta offices without anyone touching a hair on his head.

It is probably worth noting that even if Barton were the poster boy for NRA-backed gun loopholes, even if he had been a convicted felon who purchased an Uzi at a gun show -- that wouldn't necessarily signal a call to action in the halls of Congress. It was a year ago this week that two Capitol Hill police officers were shot right outside the office of DeLay, who has received $28,000 in NRA money since 1986. That tragedy hasn't affected DeLay's stance on gun control one iota.

"Is it going to take something like this to happen in all 435 congressional districts in America, in all 50 states, before we do something?" an exasperated Lewis asked.

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