Re: OT Atlas Shrugged.

[tourman <robercampbell@xxxxxxxxx>]

On Aug 30, 1:25=A0pm, "Robert L Bass" <Sa...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:
> "tourman" wrote:

RHC:  Gun control Canadian style is nowhere near the same thing. It's
a
>  contrived situation. Canadians look south and see the carnage in the
> major cities due to the illegal, criminal use of handguns and have
> decided that we will not tolerate that kind of situation as a society.
> At the same time, politicians have deliberately distorted the real
> truth that ownership by honest citizens is not and never will be a
> problem, and have used this as a way of manipulating uninformed public
> opinion in order to pass ridiculously rigid and dangerous anti-gun
> laws...
>
RLB:  We have the same thing here, but not yet as bad on the national
level.
> Personally, I would rather that no one in America owned a handgun. =A0Sin=
ce that
> is never going to happen and since criminals will ignore any laws we pass=
, the
> next best thing is to properly train all gun owners and to insist that gu=
ns be
> properly secured when not in the direct control of the owners. =A0That's =
the
> only kind of "gun control" that I would support (not that anyone in gover=
nment
> cares what I, you or anyone else here thinks). :^).

RHC: On that, we may be a few steps ahead. What is actually good about
our laws is the basic control over who may or may not own any kind of
firearm (legally of course). Background criminal checks and a
mandatory safety course are part of the "good". Enabling this sort of
thing actually works to our favour in that it decreases the hue and
cry for more controls overall, since it can help to limit the number
of certain types of casual, needless deaths (kids playing with guns
for example), which inevitably leads to public questions about the
sheer stupidity of these deaths (which in turn, leads to more demands
to tighten up the laws...). Plus it ensures that those who do own
firearms don't do so just because they can, and have no real interest
in them or training to use them whatsoever.

One of the things I have observed about my US shooting friends is the
far too casual way they handle and especially store their guns. I know
they have the right to protect themselves within their home (unlike
us), but every firearm should be treated at all times with respect due
to it's potential for damage. A loaded, unrestrained gun of any kind
around the home is a disaster waiting to happen. Legally we in Canada
are required to store all firearms within a defined set of safety
parameters, which usually means unloaded in a simple and inexpensive
gun safe. When I leave the home, I feel much better knowing that a
thief would likely never have the opportunity to steal them, if for no
other reason than they are locked up in a huge gun safe behind a
professionally installed monitored alarm system ( a REAL one, not an
ADT / Brinks bullshit system....)

Where you and I might disagree is when you say that you wish all
handguns were gone. This kind of thinking based strictly on the type
of firearm leads inevitably to stricter, and very unfair gun control.
A gun is a gun is a gun! This kind of thinking has lead to the
stupidity we have here in abundance in Canada, where the government
has a list of all sorts of long and short guns which are "prohibited"
based on nothing more than barrel length, calibre, or its "military
look". There is absolutely no logic behind this. It is also totally
controlled by bureaucrats who have no concern about honest people who
own them who suddenly discover they are now worthless on the open
market, and unusable one day for all practical purposes.

There is no reason whatsoever that honest people should be denied
access to handguns; the issue is ensuring that 1- those who have them
are safe with them both in usage and storage and 2- working towards
the impossible goal of keeping them out of the hands of the criminal
element as much as possible (which is pretty much an impossible dream
other than those that reach them through casual theft due to improper
storage). The tremendous growth of gun crime in our major cities comes
through the black market for smuggled firearms from the US. Can we
stop it ?...not likely, but the government of the day knew about this
30 years ago and chose not to do anything about it for fear of
offending our Aboriginal people at the Ackwesasne Indian reservation
on the US border. Instead they blame the gun itself and it's
availability, as if every honest gun owner is a disaster in the
making......

However, I have long since given up on the idea that gun laws will be
designed keeping in mind the needs of those who use them the most, and
also whether the laws proposed will actually achieve what they are
designed to do (and not end up as so much "pap for the public" ).There
are so many deceitful, lying people who make up the "anti gun crowd"
that the only way to deal with them is with a huge political hammer !!
In their own way, they are no better than the criminal element they so
like to refer to when pontificating about the need for this or that
control !!  I have only one thing to say to them....may they rot in
hell !!!

Meanwhile, I'll just live with what we have and hope it doesn't get
any worse.