America's passion for guns still intact as shooting toll rises

Washington

A RIFLE as a new state symbol. A bill that lets young children use handguns under supervision. As mass shootings shatter lives, the fascination with firearms among many Americans shows little sign of fading.

Over the past week, two gunmen killed at least nine people in unrelated rampages in Michigan and Kansas. Add to that the death in Indiana of a father who was accidentally shot by his six-year-old son who found a loaded revolver lying around and pulled the trigger.

US President Barack Obama - who offers his condolences to families of loved ones lost after each mass shooting - has decried the "routine" nature of reporting about and responding…