Alphecca

It partly depends on the reaction to the 'final costs' bill that comes out of this. From what I've read people are mad about the bill they KNOW of now; by the time the accounting all comes out, they may be in a mood for torches and pitchforks, which will definately have an effect on how their reps vote.

But but but... JAnet Reno SWORE that gun registration made Canada safer! She would NEVER lie, would she?

It doesn't matter now what their majority is.

They were able to put someone who pledged to destroy it in charge of it. If worse comes to worse, the minister in charge can simply order the records to be piled into a parking lot and torched, and tell the .gov.ca employees that they are all laid-off/reassigned, and tell stores to stop sending them information.

Ina parliamentary system, the ministers do as they please until a vote of no-confidence.

It is rubbish to say that ministers do as they please until a vote of no-confidence; even the government has to respect the law or change it, and to change any law you need a majority vote in Parliament. Fortunately, registry of long guns is such a stupid idea, even the Liberals, or at least some of them, will find it too embarassing to continue to support it.

I linked to this blog via instapundit.com. Conservatives and Libertarians are both using this article as evidence that gun registration doesn't work. But I've got questions as to whether we should accept that claim, and this evidence, as universal procedure.

The article talks about long-gun registration. What ARE Canada's gun laws to begin with? (I don't know, I'm ASKING THE QUESTION.) There's no mention of handguns at all in this article.

What is the per capita handgun crime ratio in Canada and the U.S.? Whatever it is, I'm quite sure it's a damn sight higher in America. Canada's a pretty sedate place overall.

Are handguns legal in Canada?

It seems common sense that few people commit crimes with "long-guns" to begin with -- can't conceal them very well. They're much better for hunting or protecting yourself from polar bears up in Manitoba where, I hear, they're roaming through the streets gouging up people's Suburbans.

So I can totally understand why long-gun registration in Canada wouldn't be cost-effective.

But that doesn't speak AT ALL to the larger question of whether gun registration in America is effective at cutting crime and/or easing the prosecution of criminals.

Also, the argument that "criminals don't register guns" may be true in part -- but some criminals, to be sure, take their legal and registered guns to kill their spouses in crimes of passion. Or commit second-degree murder. Heck, let's face it: depending upon the situation, someone with a gun obtained legally has the potential to use it in either a legal or an illegal manner.

So before you come after me with your legally purchased and registered gun, think about that for a second.

"Heck, let's face it: depending upon the situation, someone with a gun obtained legally has the potential to use it in either a legal or an illegal manner."

Remove the word "gun" and replace with "pet hamster".

Then think about that for a second.

Uh, Digman,

Using your logic we should be registering kitchen knives, hammers and ... well "pet hamsters" as well, no?

Gee, that might costly, no?

I'd hold off on hoisting some Blues for little while. It would be counter to the fundamentals of the modern state for any government to allow its disarmed citizenry to freely rearm.

Remember, there's a big difference between "killing" a program and putting it "on ice" for later use. Also, I'm aware the program "only" required registration not confiscation. Even so, there were many, many gun owners who chose to turn their guns over to police for "disposal" rather than deal with the onerous paper work, training classes, range memberships, storage requirements, etc.

As they say, criminals don't register guns, but as you point not all criminals start that way.

But then you start working your way down into the motivations behind the crime, and the mindset of the criminal. Odds are, using your example, if someone murders their spouse, it's either based on raw emotion (caught in bed with someone else, say), or simple greed (killed for the life insurance). It's rarely much more complicated than that. In the large, we're pretty simple creatures (though of course there are exceptions).

The thing is those kinds of crimes are typically readily solved, and a registered firearm, used or not, has little to do with the solving of the crime. Most (not all, just most) people have difficulty emotionally dealing such heinous acts, particularly people that don't have a support system surrounding them helping them get through the stress of it. If you're in a criminal organization, or in the military, or in law enforcement, you're surrounded by folks able to help you cope with the ordeal.

If you're alone, it's hard to call your best friend and get counseling on murdering your spouse. And when you have an investigator questioning your every move, it's simply a difficult situation to be frosty and on your toes with the details of the plot.

This state of mind of the killer is more what leads to their conviction.

For arbitrary gun crime, you're given little but a body and a bullet. While there have been rare cases where legitimate owners of registered odd ball calibre pistols have been questioned based on their registration, a body with a 9mm (an extremely popular calibre) in it doesn't really narrow down the pool of potential shooters.

Finally, and this is quite important, registration doesn't PREVENT crime. While in some rare instances it may well help solve a crime, it doesn't prevent it at all outright. While a family of a slain loved one may cry for justice, they'd rather have the person not be killed in the first place.

So, let's review. For the commited criminal within even a loose criminal organization, registration is ineffective as they use illegal weapons in the first place.

For common domestic crime, registration firstly doesn't prevent it, nor does it really solve the crime. I'm not saying registration has never been used in solving a crime, but anecdotally it's been very rare, and I do not believe it was a centerpiece of an investigation, rather just one more supporting bit of a larger case.

What are the downsides of registration? Why all the fuss? Why do gun owners even care? Our cars are registered, our dogs, we have drivers licenses, etc.

Side stepping completely the gun rights issues, which is a LARGE topic, what's the complaint?

The basic complaint is simply confiscation. Disarming the public is generally considered a Bad Thing, and the only thing that can facilitate wide scale confiscation is registration. You can't confiscate (efficiently) what you don't know exists.

Having to knock on every door and ransack every residence is not particularly good public policy compared to sending out letters and having folks casually submit firearms to a public authority, and then having followups on folks that are on the roles but have not turned in their guns.

Disarming the public turns out be inneffective in terms of crime control, for the very reasons mentioned above. To have your arms confiscated, you need to have them registered. Criminals do not register their firearms, therefore (save those caught in the act) criminals do not have their arms seized or turned in to authorities.

So, how does that help the crime problem if the criminals are still armed?

The only thing it can potentially do is dry up a large resource for illegal firearms (specifically stolen firearms from legal owners). But it turns out that any group that can smuggle in illegal drugs, illegal immigrants, illegal sex workers, or a variety of other illegal contraband can also readily smuggle in illegal firearms.

None of these techniques restrict the criminals hardly at all, particularly in the free societies of the West where trade is the primary import, and its sheer volume limits enforciblity of ports of entry.

The other side of the confiscation issue is the more extreme side, and that's basically State abuses against the populace. Currently, many are watching Zimbabwe for the foot to drop on an edict from the State to confiscate firearms as the State continues to pressure the white farmers there, and many fear the consequences should that happen.

So, as you can imagine, many gun owners who see firearms not simply as a hobby or sport, but as a means of self-defense are very leary of registration. The potential costs of registration (widespead confiscation) don't seem to balance the potential benefit (occasional successes in criminal investigations).

They are scraping the LONG GUN registry. I assume they are maintaining a hand gun registry?

I'm glad they are ending the program, but for those who believe firearms ownership to be a private, personal, "unalienable" right,they STILL don't "get it".

in reply to DIGNAM. i recently read stats on crimes per 100,000 population, can't remember the site, but, Canada had a higher rate of violent crime than the the U.S. bears looking into.

While I am certainly happy as a lark that at least SOME of the Canadians have suddenly awoken from thier derangment, I'll withold my celebrations until all of their totalitarian gun laws are in the crapper and rotating clockwise.

Keeping my fingers crossed, but not holding breath just yet.

Good news, sort of. If it is successfully killed, though, it will be the fiscal crap. If I paid a publisher $2 to pre-order a book before it was printed, and when it was one-third printed was told I'd have to come up with another $1899 for that third and who knows how much for the rest, I'd sever the transaction as fast as possible...

John Anderson:

"If I paid a publisher $2 to pre-order a book before it was printed, and when it was one-third printed was told I'd have to come up with another $1899 for that third and who knows how much for the rest...'

The only problem with that comparison is that the Canadian government didn't tell the people they had to come up with another $1,899, the Canadian people found out after the fact that the $1,899 had been deducted from their accounts.

Just sayin'.

Violent rime rates have risen in Canada concurrently with the increase in restrictions on firearms. This is consistent with Great Britain and Australia. (google for Gun Laws do Not Reduce Criminal Violence According to New Study Simon Fraser)

The violent crime rate in the US, however, has generally been going down since 1991, iirc. Crime statistics are available in raw form for download from the US Dept. of Justice.

Crime rates compared for the whole of the US vs. Canada, are, as expected, much higher for the US. We have a much larger transient population, and a much higher population density in our largest cities. When you look at lower population density states (i.e. those similar to the prairie provinces), though, there is less difference. (google for A COMPARISON OF VIOLENT AND FIREARM CRIME -- it's a doc file though you can get it from the google cache)

Plenty of info out there...just got to read it and sift the wheat from the chaff. I'd post the URL's but the comments form prevents it.

I camp, hike and kayak. Too me, a shotgun is a tool - especially were bears are involved - not to shoot them - you'll only make them angry - to scare and discurage them and to buy youself some time in a tight situation. And I have been there.
But why I have to jump through hoops to have a tool that I think is necessary and people in Toronto who have no threats at all to worry about own guns ( and shoot each other with abandon) is a mystery to me.