In the past week, a young man from Australia was killed for no apparent reason other than the fact that three mean-spirited youths were "bored."

This was a young man who had harmed no one. He was taken from his family and friends in the very prime of his life.

Just as people of common sense and decency were beginning to absorb this tragedy, an 88-year-old veteran of World War II, a man who fought and survived many battles in order to ensure that we could live in a country where things like this don’t happen, apparently was murdered, in cold blood, by two young men.

We can argue over whether both killings were racially motivated till hell literally freezes over. That’s not going to change the fact that these killings were apparently committed by young people.

In our own newspaper over the past month, story after story about crime, including one that described a deadly shooting, involved young people.

There is and has been a major breakdown of the family unit in this country over the past three decades. We are seeing the results.

We still have hope that young people like these, likely the products of bad parenting, are in the minority, despite the attention they are getting.

If they’re not and parents in this country don’t start becoming parents again, we truly are going to fail as a nation. Anarchy will rule the land.