The Great Gun Control Debate- 2.0

[LittleBlackDevil]

In any case, the liberals have put the conservatives in an unenviable position.  How do they do what their base wants, without alienating most urban Canadians?

It's a tough tactical problem.

I think one way to go about it is play the "emotional" angle rather than the facts, which often won't get through. Point out to the urban Canadians that the legal firearms owners being vilified and penalized by these laws are their neighbours, people they have BBQs with, people they trust to babysit their children. Play the angle how these people have unfairly had things taken away from them without due process?

I don't know, I'm not a politician. The only other thing I can think of is to just focus on the facts that lawful firearms owners are very safe people and try to educate the urban voter on the very strict firearms laws we already have. Most people I encounter are completely ignorant and assume we basically have a free-for-all firearms wise right now. If they knew what we already had in place they would probably be satisfied with that.

All very difficult to do when the media is not going to help spread such a message at all.

 

[MilEME09]

When was the M16 ever a machine gun? Words matter.

Yea the C7 is a Fully automatic Rifle, he messed up their, and he should know the difference, and doesn't help our case for using facts to trying and win here if he can't get terminology right.

 

[Jarnhamar]

I thought I was being clever and registered my AR15 as a receiver only. Wouldn't be able to shoot it but that way I could hand back a little piece of metal.
Didn't expect the Liberals to out clever me and prohibit Ar15 upper receivers. How sneaky.

Leslyn Lewis seems like the only Conservative contender to want to make waves about the gun ban.

 

[Haggis]

I thought I was being clever and registered my AR15 as a receiver only. Wouldn't be able to shoot it but that way I could hand back a little piece of metal.
Didn't expect the Liberals to out clever me and prohibit Ar15 upper receivers. How sneaky.

Not sneaky at all.  After Tony Clement brought the possibility of an OIC into the light last year, which sparked the "Bill Blair Sent Me" rush to purchase ARs and AR lowers, the Minister stated in January that he would not hint about what may be on the list to prevent another buying frenzy and that measures would be included to ensure that no one could circumvent future bans.  To that end, I'm sure the Liberals were mining all types of social media to identify any of the good ideas people came up with to circumvent the ban and incorporated those ideas into the OIC.  In that their stated main effort was to ban the AR, no one should be surprised that they acted to comprehensively do so in an irreversible way.

 

[ModlrMike]

...no one should be surprised that they acted to comprehensively do so in an irreversible way.

Except for the concept of Parliamentary sovereignty, which holds that a parliament cannot bind its successors.

 

[LittleBlackDevil]

...  no one should be surprised that they acted to comprehensively do so in an irreversible way.

I don't see how it's irreversible. The regulations could be changed just as easily by another OIC by a subsequent government. The OIC is actually the most reversible. Passing new legislation would be harder given the composition of the senate which would take several consecutive CPC terms to rebalance.

 

[Haggis]

I don't see how it's irreversible. The regulations could be changed just as easily by another OIC by a subsequent government. The OIC is actually the most reversible. Passing new legislation would be harder given the composition of the senate which would take several consecutive CPC terms to rebalance.

I used the word "irreversible" as I believe that the Liberals will win a majority next time around and this will become fully entrenched in legislation.

I hope I'm wrong.

 

[PuckChaser]

There's an $8B industry that hopes you're wrong too.

 

[Brad Sallows]

>In any case, the liberals have put the conservatives in an unenviable position.  How do they do what their base wants, without alienating most urban Canadians?

The Liberals might be in the unenviable position.  "Gun control" strikes me as a vote-killer issue (among firearm owners), not a single-issue winner (among everyone else, except for the activists).  The owners are likely much more numerous than the activists.  "Vote-killer" means an issue that will turn a voter away, irrespective of the remainder of the platform (opposite of "single-issue", which conventionally means a voter will support regardless of all other positions).

A couple more vote-killers (eg. leaving "big oil" to twist in the wind, which matters to workers from Atlantic Canada as much as to AB and SK), and the Liberals could be done, even if the single issue polls look favourable on each issue.

 

[Kat Stevens]

Remember not too long ago when everyone on facebook was putting up "Relax, muffins, nobody is coming for your guns" memes?  Good times.

 

[ballz]

I don't see how it's irreversible. The regulations could be changed just as easily by another OIC by a subsequent government. The OIC is actually the most reversible. Passing new legislation would be harder given the composition of the senate which would take several consecutive CPC terms to rebalance.

No, they cannot reverse it with an OIC. When the Liberals amended the legislation before the election with Bill C-71, it authorized that you could "increase" the classification level (bring it from non-restricted to restricted or prohibited, etc.) but did not authorize the executive to "decrease" it (change it from prohibited to restricted or non-restricted).

So in order to reverse this ban, the legislation would have to be amended. This was obviously a deliberate move to ensure future government's would have a much harder path to unbanning firearms. As you can probably surmise, the only way this is happening is if the Conservatives get a majority and are actually willing to spend the political capital on amending the legislation.

 

[Good2Golf]

Perhaps a tit for tat for PM Harper reducing GST from 7% to 5%.  LOC still hasn’t gone there, even though the savvy financial types know reversion to original GST levels is the only way we can come close to addressing the huge deficit the Government is building up.

 

[Haggis]

No, they cannot reverse it with an OIC. When the Liberals amended the legislation before the election with Bill C-71, it authorized that you could "increase" the classification level (bring it from non-restricted to restricted or prohibited, etc.) but did not authorize the executive to "decrease" it (change it from prohibited to restricted or non-restricted).

Has Bill C-71 or any of it's provisions actually come into force yet? I don't believe so.

 

[Colin Parkinson]

Remember not too long ago when everyone on facebook was putting up "Relax, muffins, nobody is coming for your guns" memes?  Good times.

Yea those same people are very quiet now

 

[PuckChaser]

Yea those same people are very quiet now

Same with the ABC Veterans...

 

[ballz]

Has Bill C-71 or any of it's provisions actually come into force yet? I don't believe so.

I would need a lawyer to explain that piece to me (and I'd be super interested to learn more about it), but from the articles I read, some of it active and some of it is not. I.e. I do not believe any vendors are currently required to partake in the "back-door registry" just yet.

But, given that they used an OIC to do this, that piece must have come into force or they wouldn't have been able to do this with an OIC (PM Harper had previously made it a Parliament decision).

 

[CBH99]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Ne158mb8YM




Is a Star Wars blaster considered prohibited?  restricted?  non-restricted? 

 

[Kat Stevens]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Ne158mb8YM




Is a Star Wars blaster considered prohibited?  restricted?  non-restricted? 

Not the first time Lethbridge's Finest have wound up with poop on their boots. Seems to be a bit of a clown college down there.

 

[Haggis]

But, given that they used an OIC to do this, that piece must have come into force or they wouldn't have been able to do this with an OIC (PM Harper had previously made it a Parliament decision).

An OIC was used to reclassify the cz858 and Swiss Arms rifles (which were to be grandfathered under Bill C-71.  Because the new OIC specifically make reference to the Swiaa Arms rifles as now being prohibited again.  Which, to me means that they were not yet grandfathered by C-71 but were still restricted until the is OIC came into force.

 

[PuckChaser]

Is a Star Wars blaster considered prohibited?  restricted?  non-restricted? 

Judging by the competency of whoever drafted the Liberal's OIC, it'll be prohibited in the next legislation.