myata

What was meant is of course "the type of gun used in 30% of homicides" (as follows from the context of the earlier discussion on the major types of guns involved in gun crime: handguns and long guns). Looks like you're attempting being creative, like that other guy who seem to be so popular with the conservative crowd? Again, how can one imagine having anywhere comprehensive gun control regime, if the guns of the kind that is used in a large proportion of crimes, is left out, to a very significant extent? I see, being creative again. The two largest police associations are, so I guess that'll have to close the issue for now, i.e. until you can come up with some information which would have at least some substance.

The answer to this question is right there, in the stats: countries with higher incarceration rates are almost always the same with higher rates of murder and violent crime. The cost of keeping more people in jail comes in a bundle with higher crime rates. Just what our neighbours south have and apparently what our crime tough government wants to see here.

Good information, for a change. Appreciated. To put things into perspective, a cleanup of one recent major snowstorm in this city of Ottawa cost the city $ 5 million. And the snow removal budget in the city of Edmonton is around $50 million. And the federal budget is measured, if memory serves me well, in the hundreds of billions. Some saving, given that the country's main police associations specifically asked to keep this tool. Looks like the frugality argument, on close consideration, is falling apart faster than it's glued together, is it the fate of all Harpers' policies? And here's another information. According to Corrections Canada, it costs on average $80,000 annually to keep one person in prison. Let's find out now what's Harpers' plan is going to cost us, even though he's not tellilng. And with what expected result. P.S your information on the cost of operating the registry will be entered into the list of questions. So that eventually, when the answers are more or less complete, we will be able to make our opinions based on facts and numbers - not propaganda fed by somebody bent on pressing their ideology on the society no matter what.

Then, there's no hope. Army, police and militia are all made of people. The same people who will be terrified and run away. Democracy is only as strong as its people.

Did you? Still not convinced? Well, here's more: Canadian Association of Police Chiefs: Police needs Gun Registry Ontario Police Chiefs Association: Position on Gun Control. And here's another fact: International Incarceration Rates. According to the report, Canada is second to but a few developed countries (UK, Spain, Portugal), not counting the non-disputed leader, the US, by rates of its prison population. Will Harper's policies take us to the new hights in this worthy competition? Perhaps even close the gap with the cherished leader? Or maybe get us a honorary second position, at least? Guess it's another question that won't be answered anytime soon.

And according to association of police chiefs, it's right:(CTV story). BTW was already posted earlier in this thread. Anyways I can't waste my time addressing all possible creative manipulations of information a la above, also already posted, and addressed in this thread.

Here's the questions to which answers have been requested but never given: 1. Does this country need a comprehensive gun control regime? 2. Is comprehensive gun control regime possible if guns used in 30% of homicide are left out? 3. What is the cost of operating long gun registry? > noahbody: $ 25 million annually (CTV) 4. Why is the long gun registry branded "useless" if the very people directly involved in fighting the crime (police) find it useful? > myata: Canada Police Chiefs Association, Ontario Police Chiefs Association 5. What is the cost of building and operating one prison? > $80,000 per annum per prisoner, average (Corrections Canada). 6. How many more prisons will have to be built if mandatory sentencing regime were to be implemented? 7. Why and how is mandatory sentencing regime combined with loosened gun control, is going to reduce violent crime in this country, given that it failed to it in the US in many many years of their extremely "tough on crime" justice? "Canada's incarceration rate is higher than the rates in most Western European countries but much lower than the United States" Corrections Canada Incarceration rates, per 100,000 population, developed counries only, approximate: US: 700 (highest among developed countries and in the world) Second echelon (UK, New Zealand, Spain, Portugal): 140 Third echelon (Canada, Australia): 120 EU average: 99 France, Germany: 90 Crime rates: Homicide rates, per 100,000 population: South Africa: 55 USA: 5.6 Canada: 1.8 EU average: 1.6 Violent crimes: International Crime Statistics 8. Other than mandatory sentencing, what are Harper's government plans on controlling the illegal guns? Answers to these questions cannot be found on Harper's government web site. All that can is tired references to "billion dollars" and "tough on crime". I.e. propaganda. Plomp a simple digestive slogan and it's explanatory in itself. No evidence or discussion needed. No questions asked. No comments given. If that's enough for some on this boards, so be it. There's nothing to discuss. Just believe and pray to the deity of your choice. God speed.

I do not just "believe" it. It could have, and will prevent many crimes, if and when the right policies are implemented. It'll take time and effort. Nothing comes in the world perfect. Your dislike of gun control, on the hand, is little more than pure "belief" as so far you failed to prove in any remotely rational way how's spending a very modest amount to keep a useful gun control tool going is so terribly wrong, while investing massively into building more prisons, with lax gun control is going to save money and result in less crime, even though all the data cited so many times shows that this approach simply isn't working. Isn't it quite obvious by now that for you folks the dislike of gun control is purely ideological? There's no rational substance to it, other than "I don't believe". As I don't believe in climate change, I don't believe that the others should be able to marry who they want, that dinosaurs walked the Earth 65 million years ago?

While majority did what? Came out in the street, supported the opposition, showed their disapproval of Hitlers tacktics - or pretended to not notice? Then came out in big numbers to great him into the power. It's everybody's responsibility to keep open mind and not swallow anything that is fed to us by propaganda. As said, a democracy is only as strong as people's committment to it.

OK, are you just repeating it after Mr Harper, or you actually know the cost of operating the registry now that its up and running? For the good that it can do, see above. For example police could have been alerted to that Dawson guy who just kept on buying powerful guns - for entertainment, presumably? Then, this government isn't very forthcoming with that illegal gun control either. See the case of a proposed policy to mark imported guns, that was supposed to simplify identification of illegal guns and was also recommended by the police. It was quietly abandaned by the government, with no explanation or comments. Finally, mandatory sentencing isn't free either. We'll need more jails, and a lot more jails. Prison population per capita in the States is about 5 times that of Canada. Is anybody telling us how much it's going to cost? And what is a better solution? Gun control, less guns in the public, plus specific targeted measures aimed at addressing specific incidents of violent crime wherever they develop, or loose gun ownership, supertight sentencing, 4 times more prisons, and X times more violent crime?

Thank you. I think you aren't alone there, and many of Harpers supporters cherish the same freedom loving views. Along with dislike of others marital choices, somehow, but that's a different question. If only they had your courage to state it openly in public.

Yep, registered long gun owners, like Montreal shooter, like Dawson shooter, like OC Transpo shooter, like at least two family suicide shooters in Ottawa this year that are still fresh on my memory. Many (all of the mentioned) long gun crimes involve multiple victims. In the final analysis, long guns are responsible for 30% of murders, and if they are left out of control, there's no point in pretending that this country has anywhere near comprehensive gun control. As of now, Florida's murder rate is 1,129 with 18 million of population (from your link). For the whole Canada, 2006 it's 605 (Stats Canada). Do the math. Do we really want to be like Florida? As I already said, I'll take the word of police on the usablity of the registry. That you still fail to answer is how much of taxpayers many it'll cost to keep it going. Against the cost of keeping five (5!) time more prisoners, for the Florida solution to work - what would that cost to a taxpayer, ever wondered?Incarceration rate US, Incarceration rate Canada. Combined with 5 times higher crime rate too. Looks like a worthy model to follow, in your (and Harpers) view at least.

Hitler could only become Germany's and Europe's bully because at some point he and his bunch of bullies got support, whether open or silent, of the majority of population. At some point of time the population abandaned its democratic state in favour of the strong man option. Power structures of the state became weak while bully's grew in power. And so on. The only defense against this happening again is the one that was so well demonstrated in the OP example. That is for the majority to remain open minded, involved and courageous to act when necessary rather than bury their heads in the private affairs.

In the year that it was established (was it even a full year? who knows). Good job echoing Harpers propaganda, but what if you tried an intelligent discussion for a change? And why, I wonder? The only argument put forward against long gun registry by Harper's crowd so far, was its efficiency (see below for more on that). A buddy you quoted earlier was having issues with the handgun registration, for the same reason. Why then keep one, but not the other? Why not do away with it completly? What's the underlying logic? Or is it, to do away with it (gun control that is) completely, at some future time maybe? What you forgot to mention is the level of gun crime in Florida prior, and after, implementation of these measures. I suspect it's still many multiples of Canada's. So should we really aspire to become more like Florida? Adopt their measures and strategies? Become more like them? You see, this is my real beef with the Harper's crowd. It's not what they think or believe. It's that they'll never say it out in the open. Never have an intelligent discussion. Reduce it to slogans, confusion, and attack ads instead. Let's consider the registry for example. By far the most talk one'd ever hear from this government on the subject is "one billion dollars". The cost of implementation. Forget that it was a national level project requiring cooperation of all provinces. Forget daunting technical challenges associated with implementing a national data system. E.g. till this day there's no national health care information network in Canada, and one could only guess when it could be build and how much it'd cost. Forget even the fact, that just the interest on the debt run up by the previous conservative government must be by now counting in the tens of billions of dollars, with zero, zilch, nada, to show at all. And now, finally, unfortunate as it is, the billion dollars is spent, gone. No valiant assault on the registry will bring it back. The only intelligent conversation one can have at this point could be about operating costs. In the sense, do the advantages provided by the system, like having a comprehensive gun control covering all types of gun for the first time in this country's history, like being able to detect when somebody is building a stockpile of weapons, like being able to check if the place already has a stockpile of weapons before police go in, like being able to collect weapons if individuals license is revoked, like being able to find out almost instantly if the gun abandonded at a crime scene belongs to somebody, etc, etc, all these advantages are worth the cost of operation. And what btw is the cost of operating the registry now, that its fully implemented? How many times has it been used so far this year? How much sense does it make to spend money to dismantle an operating system that already serves the public, as opposed to keeping it running and making it more efficient? Try to find answers on Harpers' government "information". I'm not going to waste my time though. I've seen enough already (death penaly; Kyoto; transparency; this gun control) to know with confidence that open transparent dialog to determine the best policies and strategies for the country is not something this crowd is interested in.

Interesting ... I'll refrain from comments till hearing the full details on this. I expect them to be released to the community at the earliest opportunity.

Worked up socially conservative brain simply can't hold more than one thing together, at a time. There must be one simple solution, for everything. One simple drummable slogan and all our crime issues will go away!

Here's a recent one: http://www.mapleleafweb.com/forums//index....view=getnewpost (aka Federal Politics/"Gun control") Error: "The error returned was: Sorry, some required files are missing, if you intended to view a topic, it's possible that it's been moved or deleted. Please go back and try again." Any ideas? Also if there're other similar incidents, please post them here.

Thanks to Harper's government, you cannot be sure of that. But if you're really interested to examine current state of affairs, you could find a comprehensive document, like this one from Stats Canada, not some ridiculous propaganda pseudo information Harper is putting on the government Web site, for shame: Crime Stats 2007. It shows that long guns accounted for close to 30% of homicides this year. Also prominent in assaults (~25%) and leading cause (44%) of "discharge firearm with intent" (i.e threateng by fireing a gun in a common language). There's no information on how many of those were legally acquired, but it wouldn't be a stretch of imagination to say that it's much harder to smuggle a long gun than a pistol. So, 30% of murders not worth going after? Then, in your own quote, there was a statement that perhaps, the handgun registration should also be abandoned, for the same argument (inefficiency). So, I just want to understand, what is the real loong term goal here: doing away with all gun registration? Free ownership regime, like in the US (they too must have a police check or something when buying a firearm, if I'm not mistaken). You think that, plus tougher sentences, will result in a safer Canada? Think twice. Because that's what they have in the US. With much higher levels of violent crime too. Harper is fanning out the general "crime" scare, while all the facts are showing that violent crime is actually going down. The problems in cities like Toronto, Vancouver etc, are almost all related to gang wars, and that can only be solved by specific targeted measures, which should involve, as an element, adequate sentencing for convicted offenders, no question about that. But mostly by painstakingly tracking and dismantling criminal organizations, one at a time. The Harpers response seems to be, first of all, doing away with the gun control regime. Which makes me think that perhaps, "tough on crime" isn't the same as "less crime". Tough on crime, in Harpers view, could mean bringing over US style justice. Perhaps it would encourage us to vote conservative more often. To get even tougher on crime, each time.

There's such thing which is generally defined as "progress". When people don't burn each other at a stake anymore. Accept other people, of different beliefs, persuasions and so on, living side by side. Not executing each other too. That's where mainstream of himankind is. Where the future is. Harper with his littly sticky "policies" is going against it - forward, in the past.

I gather, semantical difference between "legally owned at some point of time" and "registered" honestly escapes you? Talk about second language.

Nope, not true. Both should be addressed. Because both can and are being used to commit crime, almost daily. Harper is in this picture because he does not say clearly and openly what his real intent is. If it's reducing the crime, why would he want to do away with useful tools and strategies against recommendation of police itself? If it's tough for the toughness sake, I want him to say it in the open. Not hide behind generic slogans.

Implementation of this strategy so far has been shameful and asks for any reasonable improvements that can be found and made. The dogma that Harpers crowd throws around a lot that because of the pathetic implemenation, a reasonable strategy per se has to be abandoned. It does not have to be. A responsible government that seeks genuine progress in curbing gun violence would have adopted a multi-prong strategy. Including tougher sentences for repeated violent offenders; including stemming the flow of illegal guns from abroad; including better control over the legal guns sold in the country; and including addressing social causes of the crime, etc. I was prepared to give Harper a benefit of the doubt on this issue. But his moves on gun registry and generally gun control, show that it's not their position. More and more they appear to be bent on the single "tougher mandatory sentences" strategy. Which simply will not work (see south of the border), but the worst part is that they'll take down the tools that could actually work become very useful given right strategy. I don't know, Wilber. And neither Harpers government, no its proponents on this board would answer one simple question: how many crimes are committed with legally owned (at some time) guns. We know that it's many because these crimes are also in the news.

What about over one third of firearms which were not handguns? How many of those were legally owned (at some point of time)? What about unknown number of the handguns which were never recovered? How many of those were legally owned (at some point of time)? And why is this "information" being presented in the form of a 5th grade sharade? Problems with English reading comprehension? Or just basic logic?

You can say that, but it does not follow from the quote you provided. Until there's a clear statistics for gun crimes committed with legally owned guns, you can say all you want. It won't change the fact that these crimes are common, because they are on the news all the time. Maybe, but association of police chiefs is not. In whose common sense? Many people think that registry should stay. Police chiefs do. Fraser guy does not. If there's a complicated issue, before a minority government, that cannot by itself make laws, wouldn't it be a prime reason to have a public discussion and a decision of the parliment? Well, it's about fifth time I have to say it in this discussion, and the last one too. If it's really hard to comprehend, so be it. God bless you. Here it goes, slowly: gun registry - is not - a replacement - of all other instruments - and policies - just one of them - and useful at that - according to police professionals - period.

No, no proof, correct. And despite what all the planet has to do, nor its position in the heart of the conflict, nobody seem to be concerned. Or worred. One tiny bit. Now compare this with all the fuss and hoopla unleashed around Iran. Where nukes do actually not exist. Wonder. Never ends.