"Friendly" NDP and Liberal MPs to help the Cons gut Canada's gun registry today

Is registering your car "offensive" and "legislating your lives" too?

Is this next on the NRA's "freedom" agenda?

a lonely worker wrote:

Is registering your car "offensive" and "legislating your lives" too?

Is this next on the NRA's "freedom" agenda?

Its different, but I'm tired of repeating the arguments. Suffice to say its not a simple argument against 'legislating against a way of life'.

When the long gun registry fees- which are not trivial if you have even a small collection- are paid for out of general tax reveues rather than by the gun owners... then come talk to me about whether the supposed benefits of registering long guns are worth the costs; whether there is anything other than people satisfied that they are "doing something," while costing them nothing; whether the billions could be spent in far most effective ways of reducing violence against women.

martin dufresne wrote:

Maybe thats why Cullen, Ashton et al are supporting it... becasuse they know it won't pass.

[url=http://rabble.ca][color=purple]Of course. The NDP must ALWAYS be given the benefit of the doubt...[/color][/url]

I wish I knew what you're talking about.

Quote:

Previously, the Liberals could claim that while billions was spent on the registry, it was now in place, and was saving lives.

Is there verified truth to this claim? Have they, or for that matter any law enforcement organization, ever said "Here is a specific case that was only solved through the use of the Registry" or "here is a woman [or man] who would not be alive today were it not for the Registry, and here's why"?

Any? Ever?

As an urbanite, I can appreciate the merits of strict gun control, including a registry.

However, this one is a dog. It HAS cost billions, with little to show in return: http://www.cbc.ca/news/story/2004/02/13/gunregistry_rdi040213.html
The bigger story here, which the Liberal media has failed to engage, is not the vote on the registry, but how this vote is indicative of a larger Tory strategy that favours division and personal political gain over finding a way to make all Canadians safer.
Charlie Angus zeroed in on this recently:

Mr. Angus said he will vote for C-391 in order to move it to committee but said the Conservatives "don't really care about what's good gun policy, they're only interested in where they can score a few points."

"They're full of shit, they don't care whether I vote for it or vote against it. To them this is an attempt to whip up rural Canadians, and pit rural Canadians against urban Canadians. It's a very ugly, divisive strategy, so they know where I stand, they know where I've always stood, they just don't care," said Mr. Angus.

http://www.thehilltimes.ca/page/view/gun_bill-11-2-2009

I'm not opposed in principle to a long gun registry.

But the boondoggle doesn't end with those already sunk billions.

And despite there being no compelling evidence that there is a baby somewhere in that bathwater, we're supposed to go on paying for this.

But not to worry folks- your boondoggle is not going to be killed.

And the Conservatives get to keep their wedge issue... for which you all so capably play the role of foil.

Everyone happy?

JimmyRiddle wrote:

But one question that people should be asking Stephen Harper and his caucus is what happened to another key plank of his election campaign?: http://www.ndp.ca/press/reality-check-harper-fails-his-own-test-for-bein...

Pulling this gun registry stunt (and it is, because as Ken says, the registry will survive in some form) is a great distraction from Harper's failed record on accountability.

Hey, I remember that speech.  Harper was all "the only way to change the way government works is to change governments".  But now that he's got all the trappings of the PMO around him, he's realized it's a lot easier to play politics the EXACT same way the Liberals have for years.

No public appointments commission.  No reforms to access to information.  Money-for-access fundraisers at the Rogers Centre.  Lobbyists coming and going from the PMO (including his pal Ken Boessenkool who lobbies for H1N1 vaccine maker GlaxoSmithKlien).  Instead of Stephen Harper, it could just as easily be Jean Chretien running things in Ottawa.

You sure have changed, Steve-o.

The registry has always seemed like a waste of resources to me. The big gun problem in Canada isn't unregistered rifles, it's unregistered (and illegal) handguns and assault weapons and dealing with that requires better border security.

It does not cost anything to register your rifle or other long gun in Canada. The fee is in licensing, which this bill will not abolish.

Loretta wrote:

It does not cost anything to register your rifle or other long gun in Canada. The fee is in licensing, which this bill will not abolish.

Not your pocket book directly, but as a tax payer it does.

martin dufresne wrote:

Doug: The big gun problem in Canada isn't unregistered rifles, it's unregistered (and illegal) handguns and assault weapons...

Except if you are a battered woman, or a cop trying to help her and not given access to a gun registry to know what to expect when you show up. Many of the 914 women and children killed by men in Quebec since Dec 6, 1989 have been killed by firarms that were neither handguns nor assault weapons. But hey, that's a man's right, ain't it?

 

This is the usual lie told by gun grabbers like martin, first of all, licensing is seperate from the registry and will still be required after the registry is abolished (if it is), licensing requires a training course, significant paperwork (including your spouses consent if you have one, questions about your mental state etc). If a police officer wants to know if an individual possibly owns a firearm they can already check the licensing system, futher no intelliegent officer would assume even after a check showed no firearms that none would actually exist, as has been said many times, not everyone is licensed or registered, like say criminals..

No amount of paperwork is going to prevent anyone from shooting someone else, it is always a tragedy.  Why people like martin always need to stoop to the level of the last sentence in his above quote is partly why the registry never should have been and should be abolished now, simply put there was no rational basis for it's implementation. The registry was a political/emotional response to a terrible act, it has been ineffective at preventing crime (please don't tell me that firearms deaths have fallen-they were falling before the registry).  How many people have been shot with handguns in our cities over the last 20 years martin? Im sure you are aware that the registration of handguns has been required since 1934, it sure doesn't prevent crime does it, no more than a knife or blunt object registry would, no doubt those things have killed their share of women too.

Another often mentioned tidbit is that firearms suicides have gone down, this seems to be true, but the overall suicide rate hasn't changed, so fewer people are shooting themselves, but just as many are dying, again, terribly effective.

I own a few firearms, all are registered, that fact doesn't prevent me from hurting someone with them.  My physical strength would allow my to over power my spouse and my children, yet I don't beat them.  There are many knives in my house, i am competent in the use of a knife, yet I have stabbed no one.  More people are killed in this country every year by incompetent drivers than are killed by firearms, let alone by registered long gun owners, cars are registered, this registration is seemingly ineffective in preventing stupidity.

If I really believed the registry would prevent someone from killing another I would be all for it, as I said I have registered my firearms, I am far from an extremist on this issue, frankly it is terribly easy to kill someone, wether it be with a firearm or a knife or one's own hands, many women have been beaten to death.  I agree that men make up the vast majority of violent criminals and women suffer a great deal of that violence, registering my shotgun has had no impact on that violence.  If I was a violent person in a murderous rage I could easily accomplish my goal without a firearm, than again, imagine if women were licensed and trained to use a handgun how many lives could potentially be saved..o but im sure you're against that as well.

You are against guns, period, you long ago left your rationality at the door.

Jack Layton was just on Evan Solomon's show and said he, and especially Joe Comartin, are strong supporters of the long gun registry. It strikes me as a bit odd that the only progressive party in Parliament nevertheless possibly will have members voting against their own leader's wishes, even though it is a free vote.

Boom Boom wrote:

Yea - 164 Nay - 137

Layton also said in that interview I mentioned that he fully understand the plight of NDP MPs in rural riidings such as Charlie Angus.

So do I. Their "plight" is that they have no leader.

 @ unionist

Boom Boom wrote:

 @ unionist

Boom Boom, do you know why the NDP wouldn't whip their caucus to vote against this filthy legislation? Do you really believe that there's some "law" that prevents whipping a vote on a private members' bill, as the media would have us believe? Can you explain why Layton is supporting draconian crime bills, while going soft in the head on gun control? Do you not see this as absence of leadership?

Doug wrote:

martin dufresne wrote:

Except if you are a battered woman, or a cop trying to help her and not given access to a gun registry to know what to expect when you show up.

A cop is being dumb if he or she shows up anywhere and assumes there are no weapons, regardless of what the registry has to say. Remember that in order to buy a gun legally in the first place you have to have a license, and that information was and would continue to be available to police.

I don't believe they always have the resources and manpower available to send the equivalent of a US style SWAT team to every domestic dispute. Sometimes all they have is a male and female pair at the scene, and they have little idea of what to expect. The odd time what's needed is the neighborhood or apartment block taping off in cases of gun play.

Its worth noting that the NDP has actually NEVER supported the Liberal gun registry in the first place. When it first was brought in in the mid-90s, Svend Robinson was the only NDP MP who voted for it - all the others voted no. You can debate the merits of the issue, but the fact is the NDP has always been very critical of the Liberal long gun registry - and with good reason since its been so horribly mismanaged and misconceived.

Fidel wrote:

Doug wrote:

martin dufresne wrote:

Except if you are a battered woman, or a cop trying to help her and not given access to a gun registry to know what to expect when you show up.

A cop is being dumb if he or she shows up anywhere and assumes there are no weapons, regardless of what the registry has to say. Remember that in order to buy a gun legally in the first place you have to have a license, and that information was and would continue to be available to police.

I don't believe they always have the resources and manpower available to send the equivalent of a US style SWAT team to every domestic dispute. Sometimes all they have is a male and female pair at the scene, and they have little idea of what to expect. The odd time what's needed is the neighborhood or apartment block taping off in cases of gun play.

This changes the fact that there may or may not be weapons available at the scene how exactly?  The answer is that it doesn't, and the registry never changed that, any police officer would be a fool to put their lives into the hands of a government agency that relied upon the good nature of its citizens to register its firearms, and then there is that fact that criminals of all stripes, including abusers would not or would be less likely to register in the first place.

A truly effective system.  No no, we can't let convicts serve their full term, thats so cruel, but spending a ton of money registering millions of gun owners that never harmed anyone to prevent (actually prevent nothing) the .00001 percent that might is good governement and good law...wow, just wow.

Which was my point. It would be more cost-effective to have spent that money on improved border security to reduce the illegal importation of weapons rather than creating and running the registry.

Whats your evidence its pandering Unionist?

Charlie Angus and Alex A. both said that despite their misgivings about how the issue has been used, they would vote against the bill. Don't get more rural than there ridings. And presumably there were others the same.

The two whose feelings I know and voted for- are like me: they are completely opposed to the system and have always been clear about that.

Stockholm wrote:

Its worth noting that the NDP has actually NEVER supported the Liberal gun registry in the first place.

I'm curious how this reconciles with Jack Layton on national television today saying he and especially Joe Comartin strongly support the national long gun registry.