Alphecca

"But... But...," Jeff Spluttered...

Here's the latest from Canada:

Just this week, two men were arrested at gunpoint in downtown Toronto and charged with possession of two handguns stolen from a gun collector in Oshawa last week. Ken Foster, 67, lost his entire collection of handguns when thieves broke into his home while he was in hospital recovering from his fourth stroke and made off with his prized firearms, which included 10 Lugers.

Robert Massey of Orangeville and Brent Matheson of Toronto, both 33, face several gun charges, including illegal possession of firearms for the purpose of trafficking and "unauthorized presence" of a firearm in a motor vehicle.

On Dec. 8, gun collector Lionel Weese returned to his Consecon, Ont., home to find 23 handguns, including five .45-calibre pistols, missing. The thieves did not touch any of the roughly 30 long guns Weese had in his home.

Late last year, thieves broke into the Parliament St. offices of lawyer Arthur Brown and made off with the 17 handguns he was storing in a gun safe. Only one of those guns has been recovered.

Gun collector and firearms trainer Mike Hargreaves also lost some 35 handguns and assault rifles when thieves broke into his Gilder Ave. apartment in December 2003, and spent two days cracking a 1,700-pound safe to steal the weapons.

In any event, Toronto Mayor David Miller declares:

Earlier this week, Mayor David Miller said recent gun seizures have proven there is a "direct link" between break-ins at the homes of collectors across Ontario and guns on Toronto streets.

"If somebody steals a canoe, it's a private problem," Miller said. "If somebody steals a gun, it's a public problem."

While both Miller and Premier Dalton McGuinty have called for a total ban on handguns, Attorney General Michael Bryant wants more provincial powers to control the weapons.

And if guns are a temptation to steal, shouldn't high-priced or popular cars that are often stolen, either for chop-shops or to be used in crime, also be banned? How about banning certain legal perscription drugs that are often targets of theft? Homes, drugstores, et al are constantly broken into so drug addicts can get their Oxycontin? There's a public problem if I ever heard one. So what if cancer patients have to writhe in pain as a result?

Anyway, this is all so silly. If there's a problem with criminals stealing gun collections then Miller should direct his energies to law enforcement, catching and incarcerating the offenders, and making sure they stay in jail forever. Oh, and doing away with gun and ammo registrations that provide roadmaps to where mutants can obtain their wares...

Update 2/11/06: As if she was channeling me, Chris Conn writes in the Toronto Star:

Mayor David Miller and Attorney General Michael Bryant claim that banning legal ownership of firearms is the silver bullet to curbing gun crime, linking recent gun thefts of large collections as proof.

They again seem to be overlooking the obvious: How are these large collections being found by thieves? Could it be the Ontario law requiring ammunition purchases to be recorded, thus leaving a poorly secured paper trail at every Canadian Tire, Wal-Mart and other Ontario ammunition suppliers? Could organized crime have infiltrated the Canadian Firearms Registry, supplying valuable and sensitive information to criminals?

It can be no coincidence that collections of large diversity are stolen, some by means of sophisticated tools to bypass security measures and safes. Average collectors have very small numbers of firearms; the recent break-ins that Miller and Bryant speak of held dozens of firearms. It does not take a genius to put two and two together.