Ben: >"In Canada,we have had a hand gun ban since 1938."<

No, that is incorrect. We have not had a ban, but the right to ownership with restrictions. A ban means that no one can legally possess any hand gun, period.

Society is evolving so one would expect almost everything to eventually come up for review and even change: Same sex marriage, abortion, pot possession, ownership of lethal pets, rifles, protection of property and so forth and even hand guns. If a collectors hand gun collection is stolen, as has happened, how can society protect itself from the potential crimes being committed using these easily concealed weapons?

A few years ago a collection of 30 weapons was stolen. 12 crimes were committed using these, including one murder.

How can a gun owner assure the rest of society that he/she will always be in total control of the weapons?

DIPLOMAT You are a very stupid moron.over 90% of firearm crime IS done with firearms that are not registered. Stop the firearms at our Border..which is impossible.you can not stop Drugs, How in the hell can you stop firearms.ooo I know PUNISH the people that OBEY the law.they will do as they are told , Not like the Black and east indian GANGS DIPLOMAT..YOU AND YOUR GANG OF LIBERAL THIEFS..SCREW OFF..

>DIPLOMAT You are a very stupid moron.<

Thank you! Whenever somebody reacts in such a "reasonable" manner I know that my comments were right on.

Sorry if you can't handle opinions250 without losing your cool!

Dons reaction was harsh but lets face it he is right on lawfull Canadians who posses firearms are the people getting the screws put to them here.2 billion dallors for a registry that doesn't work and never could because most crimes are done by criminals last time I look and they don't care about registration.So instead of more laws and wasted money why not inforce the rules we already have.

fedup: "So instead of more laws and wasted money why not inforce the rules we already have. "

Don is right to be upset. But, there is not one political party in Canada that will get tough enough to really crack down on the criminals.

The Conservatives and the Liberals had their opportunities to toughen up the laws and make sure they are enforced. The NDP will never take a tougher stand, it goes against its social agenda.

We live in an aimless, directionless society. It is not lawless, because there are all kinds of laws, but the laws are only on paper.

What do we do next?

---there is not one political party in Canada that will get tough enough to really crack down ---
How do we know this? The the only party we've had for 10 years has done nothing about it for sure! They have proven to us that they are too incompetent to handle our money. We have to give another party a chance to correct this spending stupidity.

Everyone knows that the Gun Registry was brought in by the Liberals after the Massacre of the 14 women in Montreal. This legislation was brought in by the Liberal Alan Rock and his cronies for no other reason than to gain votes in the metropolitian areas, and they hoped it would also generate some money. As it turned out it cost the Government somewhere in the area of 2 billion dollars and is still climbing. As for the Political gains in the Metropolitian areas it worked, even though as you can now see more people are being killed by registered, and non registered guns and handguns. The Liberal Paul Martin is now trying to get some Political Mileage out of banning handguns.

Does anyone seriously believe this man. He must think the voters in the Metropolitian areas are stupid, or he would not try to pull off the same stunt again. He knows that what he is doing is BS, how come the voters cant figure this out. The Liberals could care less for the law abiding citizens in the rural areas, Yukon, NWT, etc because they get little if any support from them.

Hopefully the voters in Ontario, and other Metro areas will wake up and kick Paul Martin and his band of losers out of office.

LEFTOLEROUX...You say you do not call people names..You called me racist, WHY because I called the gangs that are shooting up TO and the Lower mainland Blacks and Indo canadians..Leftoleroux. the gangs are Black and Indo canadian. JUST FACTS person who is afried to use her or his Real Name I am not a coward MY name is Donald Mackenzie I will stand by what I write. I do not hide behind some False NAME. LOL

The gangs are ino canadian and and black and chineese. That's the way it is. Call a spade a spade. Good for you Don using your real name. Me too.

Mike Hawryluk

Hasn't anyone wondered why one needs to pack a gun, knife or any other type of weapon?

Two reasons come to mind. Protection or intent to wound someone else.

Now, I understand why one may feel the need for protection.

But, intent to hurt or kill someone else is another issue. Taking away a bad person's gun is not going to take away the reason they have one.

Our court system is bogged down with cases. Our jails are already full. We cry for more RCMP to catch the bad guys, while lawyers and judges get them off and let them go.

There is no justice. No deterent. No fear. No penalty. So what? Slap my wrist again. (Enter bleeding hearts when we do)

And we wonder why we have these problems in our society? Well, what we are doing is not working. More RCMP, more lawyers, more judges, more jails are not going to change this problem.

We need to change how we handle crime. So, let's begin to make some efforts in this direction.

We have all seen how the Liberals have dealt with this issue. Time to remove a few of them who contribute to the problem. Chester

Ps. Maybe a change in dealing with the bad guys will affect to many Liberals. Just a passing thought

Chester: "We need to change how we handle crime. So, let's begin to make some efforts in this direction."

Ok, how would you handle crime differently?

Diplomat asked: How would I handle crime? That's a big question. But, I have some thoughts to share.

First, we need to look at our Laws. The first reason laws exist were to serve the public.

They were designed to not interfere with an individual's liberty or to force people to do things they didn't want to do, nor to prevent them from doing things they wanted to do.

So, the bottom line for law's to exist at all must be to protect people's rights and not restrict them.

As far as I am aware, there are 3 kinds of law: First is Common Law. This is a group of laws which have been handed down to us, mostly as matters of common sense. We are aware of the term "Caveat Emptor" which means "Let the buyer beware". Another one is "Caveat Subscriptor" which means "Let him who signs his name, beware" and makes the person signing a document responsbile for reading it first. These are examples of Common Law.

The second is Case Law. This is when a case which is similar to a previous case is before the court, the decision in the previous case is the law which will be followed, unless there are material differences between the two cases. (It would be very unfortunate if the previous case was ruled in error)

The third type of law is Legislated Law or Legislation. These are laws that are passed by Parliament, by Provincial Governments or by Municipalities.

Legislation always takes precedence over Common Law and Case Law. This means that it is possible for governments to overrule tried and tested common laws which have been around for thousands of years, merely by passing anew law.

One would think that the purpose of passing laws at all, should be to simplify our relationships and settle disputes. But, the reality is to make things easier for the government, to quiet the vocal minority, to assure the votes of a particular group or region, to enlarge a bureaucracy or to try to make things equal.

In almost every case, these legislated laws restrict individual liberty in the name of "the good of the country, unless it is to safeguard the individual's right to his life and property.

It is so unfortunate that we seem to have a national Canadian characteristic of thinking that if we perceive something is wrong in our society, the only way to correct it is to pass another law.

So, more and more laws are added every year to the immense set of regulations, whose purpose is to govern everything we do. These laws in themselves do not in fact rule us. They merely make it more difficult to do the things we're going to do anyway. What determines whether or not they are effective is whether or not they are complied with.

We have laws against murder, arson, suicide, rape, theft, burglary, vandalism, prostitution, assault, price-fixing, embezzlement, drunken driving, smoking in elevators etc. etc.

Laws do not prevent crime. They merely state what activities will be punished by the courts if you are caught.

Most everyone breaks the law. Each of decides for ourself just where to draw the line, what the odds of being caught are and breaks the odd law. For example: some people park in a handicap parking zone. Some exceed the speed limit. Some shoplift. Some cheat on their income tax. Some on the otherhand try to abide by every law and are honestly astonished when they are stopped in the park by some cop and told they are violating some law they've never heard of.

Common sense and Common Law are no longer the foundation of our justice system. We are finding that we are under the control of arbitrary legislation and legal decisions by unelected judges. Many of our laws make very little sense to the public.

Let me give you a few examples of a lack of common sense.

We have very intricate immigration laws that restricting anyone from entering the country without going through some rigorous and time-consuming channels. How is it that a bunch of people can climb out of a boat and be welcomed with open arms?

Why can an apologist for the government of Iraq get special fast-track permission to enter the country, while immigration applicatnts who abide by the rules must wait months and years to be allowed in

Why does a man who confessed to murder get set free because the arresting officer did not advise him of his right to free legal aid?

Why is an employee (who is forced to pay union dues even though he is not a union menber) compelled to allow the union to donate part of his dues to a political party that he does not support?

Why does a man, who was conviction for armed robbery was overturned have to suffer 20 months in custody and incur $100,000 in legal costs while refugees and fugitives from justice in other countries are defended in our courts at taxpayers' expense?

I realize that all these laws are passed with the noblest of intentions. Such as: "They are going to make the country better", "they will make it run more efficiently" or "they will make it a just society".

Well, it just doesn't work. The reason is that instead of allowing individuals to rely on the common law to settle their disputes, politicians try to pass laws to cover every conceivable situation that may occur.

We are so bogged down trying to comply with this mess, we are unable to and ineffective in delivering justice.

So, the bottom line is this, the criminals are just the symptom of a justice system that is unable to deal with them.

Laws should exist to protect an individual's freedom and not to control our society.Laws should not replace common sense. Chester

>Laws should exist to protect an individual's freedom and not to control our society.Laws should not replace common sense. Chester<

I agree that an individual's rights must be protected at all times but how about laws that protect society (a group of individuals)from the actions of an individual?

We need a Charter of Duties and Obligations in addition to the Charter of Rights and Freedoms that we have already for individuals.

These duties and obligations may be based on Common Sense, as you suggest.

(Now I better duck because the bricks are going to start flying!).

Chesters got it right. We dont need more laws, we need to use the ones we have and we need to get rid of a bunch of them. Many have heard that the road to hell is paved with good intentions, however very few people understand what that saying means. It means that every new law is passed with good intentions, however each one continues to restrict your freedoms. Eventually you will not be much better that a totalitarian state.

One example is Gun Registration. Here is a situation where a person who had guns in his family for hundreds of years and never broke the law, is now required to register his guns because some politician back East is trying to make political hay out of a very unfortunate situation. Another example is people on bicycles who are required to wear head gear. The rationale for this law is that it reduces Health costs. However it also reduces you freedom to chose whether you want to wear a Helmet or not. There is no really good investigative numbers to substaintiate the savings, but to give you one example:: I had a friend who was out biking and while coming down a hill at a very fast pace, a hornet got into his Helmut. As a result he went ass over teakettle and seriously injured himself and was off work for months. You would never find his accident in your statistics because it would be detrimental to the established thinking.

I could give you hundreds of other cases where our laws are more about restricting freedoms rather than protecting anything, but you get the point. We have so many laws that people just disregard them, and as a result the law suffers as people lose respect for the Justice system.