We've heard a lot about crassly opportunistic politicians exploiting low-info voters. I wonder how many of Canada's urbanites would be surprised to realize that this time, that means them.
This is a useful analysis, particularly for someone like me who both has no interest in owning a gun and doesn't really have a strong opinion about gun ownership. In some ways, I think this policy is aimed a disinterested people like me -- on the surface it seems like the government is doing something about gun crime, which is both in the news in the US and in Canada as the NS murder revelations come out. It's not something I care a lot about, but I'm sure they are banking on people like me nodding -- "well, they are addressing gun crime ..." and having a vague, positive impression.
But, your analysis makes me think of the government's equally odd approach to regulation in the digital realm, which again seems aimed at something people recognize is an issue (misinformation, upheaval in domestic news industries, etc) yet seems to come up with policy that doesn't really solve the problem (and potentially creates a bunch of new problems). But, hey, they're "doing something."
It's all feeling like the real problems we face are complicated and will takes years to solve so politicians of all stripes are left looking for initiatives that have the appearance of action without really solving anything. We need to keep calling this out until they are incentivized to focus on stuff that matters!
Nice piece. Although, while ostensibly about guns and regulations, it strikes me as really a commentary on our democratic politics and its dysfunctional, if not, irrational animating logic. The antidote to low-info voters may be higher-info observers willing to expend the necessary energy. Long piece writing platforms like Substack may be filling a void left by the thinning ranks of mainstream news rooms. The issue then becomes how to influence the wider discourse. Thanks.
I am amazed at the lack of knowledge on the regulations surrounding gun ownership in this country, by not just the citisens, but those that lobby the Government for change. How is it one can lobby the Government to bring in change or new laws when they have no idea what is already in place. Either they can not be bothered to research the problem or are purely ignorant of what guns are causing the problem and where they come from. Even worse this Government acts on the words of the ignorant when they have already been informed of the reality of the situation. They know what they are doing only harms the legal gun owner and does nothing what so ever to stop the criminals. Its what makes those who do know the rules and regulations even more angry. This happens with almost everything from the purposeful destruction of the energy sector to the decimation of our Constitution and Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Its ignorance that destroys democracies and humanity, not gun ownership, not climate change, not the Governments attacks on our Rights and freedoms but the publics ignorance of what it is these regulations, laws, and rules actually consist of. That leads to the Governments purposeful, divisive, demonization, of those that do know what these documents, regulations, and laws entail and mean to the rights of all citisens, and who are willing to stand up against it. Suddenly those who know better become the enemy.
Until there is severe punishment for committing a crime with a gun and double that with an illegal gun there will be no change in crime rate. No one is afraid of the big bad wolf is he isn't really big and bad.
I was SO looking forward to this article MG - you are the king on a few topics and this is one of hem. I saw an obviously thrown together article on CTV.ca about how much of a problem handguns are becoming and thought "hey, Trudeau must have handgun legislation ready to drop". My second thought was "I can't wait to see MG's take on this!"
Absolutely nailed it. This whole charade is a screen door on a submarine. Looks pretty, but is useless. Canada's gun issue is the border...pure and simple. There is no reasonable solution; monitor with drones with heat seekers? Action for the appearance of action that accomplishes nothing isn't leadership......something that is already in very short supply in this government.
I wonder if the Liberal party has pondered the possibility that whomever the CPC picks as a leader might be the next PM simply because the Trudeau brand is so broken? AKA...the Wynee treatment.
This seems like extremely short term thinking on the part of the Liberals. Gun violence seems to be getting worse. The Liberals are telling us that they're doing something to fix the problem, but are really just rearranging deck chairs. Won't they be exposed as incompetent when the gun violence continues to get worse?
Gun owning centre left leaning guy here. Yes it's a tenuous political identity.
Heavily regulated handgun hobbyists contribute almost nothing to gun crime directly, and very little indirectly. I make allowances indirectly for thefts of legal handguns and slippage from legal commerical transactions into the black market. These are small contributions to gun crime in our country. The only credit I give to the law is that it is slightly harder to smuggle when there is no legal importation. You can't fudge customs paperwork or file off the serial number of a legally imported gun. However, in a wide open free trade regime, this is very close to putting a screen door on a submarine as another commenter said. The guns will slip in.
I take issue with one fundamental argument Matt makes, that unless government fully solves a problem it has identified, it is craven political showmanship. The law as I understand it puts a generational prohibition on handguns. They can't be transferred, presumably only surrendered to your local police station when your estate is settled, if not before then.
This is a rational execution of politics by edging toward a policy goal rather than confronting it head on. This incrementalism is a way of dosing your foul tasting medicine a drop at a time to the affected constituency, in this case handgun hobbyists. We can call it chickenshit, but politicians are sometimes wise to enact change incrementally. The alternative risks actual violence in the streets.
I see the trucker protest as a direct analogy. The government took away truckers licenses to operate if they weren't vaxxed (yes there are nuances here but this is not the place). The marginal benefit to public health of these specific citizens being vaccinated was arguably low given their solitary careers. But by threatening to seize their means of income, we had a severe protest that could have gotten much more violent. It also got co-opted into a much dumber broad based protest.
Likewise, with handguns, the marginal benefit to society of prohibition would be low. But seizing them would animate rural Canadians to take to the streets in another movement that would risk political violence.
In my view, Matt is absolutely right in the totality of his argument, politicians will be craven sometimes, but being chickenshit on implementing a handgun ban over decades, not months, could actually save us all from a massive wave of protest and violence nobody wants.
There's part of the public that simply regards guns as something evil, and can't see any valid reason for private ownership. That's a big part of the audience for Liberal gun control legislation.
Like all Canadians I am sickened by the attacks using assault weapons in the US. I cannot speak to the legislation as I’m not familiar with it. I do know that I am glad the Canadian discussion right now is focused on bans rather than reflect the horrible US circle of 1. Assault 2. Thoughts and prayers 3. Argue about gun ownership
The US has a sick relationship with weapons - if Canadians can avoid that through discussion and reviewing all criticisms seriously - we will be the better for it.
When their entire licensing program was established many years ago the Canadian State criminalized every person who owned a firearm. If you’re a good citizen you get a “get out of jail card” good for five years or until you die when they come and take your property away from your heirs unless they jump through the required hoops. Tinkering at the edges with various objects and arcane regulations creating new subsets of paper criminals does not change the fundamental basis of the program. The majority - mostly uninformed urbanites -through their choice of elected representatives has decided that millions of deplorables living in fly-over country are unCanadian, somehow unworthy, and need to be watched over to ensure that they don’t stray too far from the barracoon. Any police contact is cross matched daily against the register of firearms licensee, and if a gun license holder moves he/she/it must notify the RCMP within 10 days for the lifetime of their license validity . Even convicted child molesters are only subject to this requirement for a limited time.
Criminals don't care about these bans and it won't stop them getting their greasy mitts on weapons, either. More LPC uselessness and wasting tax dollars to come. Quell surprise.
Great article. Don’t own a gun and never will. But I have no problems with responsible people having them and using them appropriately.
Brilliant politics, terrible public policy. Go after a “relatively” small group of individuals – lawful and responsible gun owners – in order to court a demographic the Liberals need to hold onto to remain in power – the "well-educated [sic] white-collar urbanites".
The Liberals know exactly where all the legal and registered handguns are (including Matt’s) thanks to the gun registry so they probably have a pretty good idea of what ridings the owners live in, and what their political leanings are (and I know that there are gun owners across the political spectrum).
But the Liberals have done their math, and have targeted a small group of law abiding individuals who probably live in ridings the party has written off anyway. And they have done this to target their base in the big cities like Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal.
I am willing to bet that the next step is to ban semi-automatic handguns (maybe leaving an exception for .22 cal) and institute a mandatory buyback as they are now pledging to do with the “assault style weapons”. But they will do this later, because they will want the press coverage generated from such an announcement during the next election campaign.
Another reason why this is pure politics is that this was done in response to sth that didn't even happen in Canada. It has always bothered me that events in USA have such an outsized influence on the Canadian politicians and media's narratives and actions. (Think Roe v Wade recently).
This is a useful analysis, particularly for someone like me who both has no interest in owning a gun and doesn't really have a strong opinion about gun ownership. In some ways, I think this policy is aimed a disinterested people like me -- on the surface it seems like the government is doing something about gun crime, which is both in the news in the US and in Canada as the NS murder revelations come out. It's not something I care a lot about, but I'm sure they are banking on people like me nodding -- "well, they are addressing gun crime ..." and having a vague, positive impression.
But, your analysis makes me think of the government's equally odd approach to regulation in the digital realm, which again seems aimed at something people recognize is an issue (misinformation, upheaval in domestic news industries, etc) yet seems to come up with policy that doesn't really solve the problem (and potentially creates a bunch of new problems). But, hey, they're "doing something."
It's all feeling like the real problems we face are complicated and will takes years to solve so politicians of all stripes are left looking for initiatives that have the appearance of action without really solving anything. We need to keep calling this out until they are incentivized to focus on stuff that matters!
Nice piece. Although, while ostensibly about guns and regulations, it strikes me as really a commentary on our democratic politics and its dysfunctional, if not, irrational animating logic. The antidote to low-info voters may be higher-info observers willing to expend the necessary energy. Long piece writing platforms like Substack may be filling a void left by the thinning ranks of mainstream news rooms. The issue then becomes how to influence the wider discourse. Thanks.
I am amazed at the lack of knowledge on the regulations surrounding gun ownership in this country, by not just the citisens, but those that lobby the Government for change. How is it one can lobby the Government to bring in change or new laws when they have no idea what is already in place. Either they can not be bothered to research the problem or are purely ignorant of what guns are causing the problem and where they come from. Even worse this Government acts on the words of the ignorant when they have already been informed of the reality of the situation. They know what they are doing only harms the legal gun owner and does nothing what so ever to stop the criminals. Its what makes those who do know the rules and regulations even more angry. This happens with almost everything from the purposeful destruction of the energy sector to the decimation of our Constitution and Charter of Rights and Freedoms. Its ignorance that destroys democracies and humanity, not gun ownership, not climate change, not the Governments attacks on our Rights and freedoms but the publics ignorance of what it is these regulations, laws, and rules actually consist of. That leads to the Governments purposeful, divisive, demonization, of those that do know what these documents, regulations, and laws entail and mean to the rights of all citisens, and who are willing to stand up against it. Suddenly those who know better become the enemy.
Until there is severe punishment for committing a crime with a gun and double that with an illegal gun there will be no change in crime rate. No one is afraid of the big bad wolf is he isn't really big and bad.
I was SO looking forward to this article MG - you are the king on a few topics and this is one of hem. I saw an obviously thrown together article on CTV.ca about how much of a problem handguns are becoming and thought "hey, Trudeau must have handgun legislation ready to drop". My second thought was "I can't wait to see MG's take on this!"
Great analysis!
Absolutely nailed it. This whole charade is a screen door on a submarine. Looks pretty, but is useless. Canada's gun issue is the border...pure and simple. There is no reasonable solution; monitor with drones with heat seekers? Action for the appearance of action that accomplishes nothing isn't leadership......something that is already in very short supply in this government.
I wonder if the Liberal party has pondered the possibility that whomever the CPC picks as a leader might be the next PM simply because the Trudeau brand is so broken? AKA...the Wynee treatment.
Nonsense policy has worked well for them on Covid. Why wouldn't it work for guns?
This seems like extremely short term thinking on the part of the Liberals. Gun violence seems to be getting worse. The Liberals are telling us that they're doing something to fix the problem, but are really just rearranging deck chairs. Won't they be exposed as incompetent when the gun violence continues to get worse?
Gun owning centre left leaning guy here. Yes it's a tenuous political identity.
Heavily regulated handgun hobbyists contribute almost nothing to gun crime directly, and very little indirectly. I make allowances indirectly for thefts of legal handguns and slippage from legal commerical transactions into the black market. These are small contributions to gun crime in our country. The only credit I give to the law is that it is slightly harder to smuggle when there is no legal importation. You can't fudge customs paperwork or file off the serial number of a legally imported gun. However, in a wide open free trade regime, this is very close to putting a screen door on a submarine as another commenter said. The guns will slip in.
I take issue with one fundamental argument Matt makes, that unless government fully solves a problem it has identified, it is craven political showmanship. The law as I understand it puts a generational prohibition on handguns. They can't be transferred, presumably only surrendered to your local police station when your estate is settled, if not before then.
This is a rational execution of politics by edging toward a policy goal rather than confronting it head on. This incrementalism is a way of dosing your foul tasting medicine a drop at a time to the affected constituency, in this case handgun hobbyists. We can call it chickenshit, but politicians are sometimes wise to enact change incrementally. The alternative risks actual violence in the streets.
I see the trucker protest as a direct analogy. The government took away truckers licenses to operate if they weren't vaxxed (yes there are nuances here but this is not the place). The marginal benefit to public health of these specific citizens being vaccinated was arguably low given their solitary careers. But by threatening to seize their means of income, we had a severe protest that could have gotten much more violent. It also got co-opted into a much dumber broad based protest.
Likewise, with handguns, the marginal benefit to society of prohibition would be low. But seizing them would animate rural Canadians to take to the streets in another movement that would risk political violence.
In my view, Matt is absolutely right in the totality of his argument, politicians will be craven sometimes, but being chickenshit on implementing a handgun ban over decades, not months, could actually save us all from a massive wave of protest and violence nobody wants.
There's part of the public that simply regards guns as something evil, and can't see any valid reason for private ownership. That's a big part of the audience for Liberal gun control legislation.
Like all Canadians I am sickened by the attacks using assault weapons in the US. I cannot speak to the legislation as I’m not familiar with it. I do know that I am glad the Canadian discussion right now is focused on bans rather than reflect the horrible US circle of 1. Assault 2. Thoughts and prayers 3. Argue about gun ownership
The US has a sick relationship with weapons - if Canadians can avoid that through discussion and reviewing all criticisms seriously - we will be the better for it.
When their entire licensing program was established many years ago the Canadian State criminalized every person who owned a firearm. If you’re a good citizen you get a “get out of jail card” good for five years or until you die when they come and take your property away from your heirs unless they jump through the required hoops. Tinkering at the edges with various objects and arcane regulations creating new subsets of paper criminals does not change the fundamental basis of the program. The majority - mostly uninformed urbanites -through their choice of elected representatives has decided that millions of deplorables living in fly-over country are unCanadian, somehow unworthy, and need to be watched over to ensure that they don’t stray too far from the barracoon. Any police contact is cross matched daily against the register of firearms licensee, and if a gun license holder moves he/she/it must notify the RCMP within 10 days for the lifetime of their license validity . Even convicted child molesters are only subject to this requirement for a limited time.
Criminals don't care about these bans and it won't stop them getting their greasy mitts on weapons, either. More LPC uselessness and wasting tax dollars to come. Quell surprise.
Great article. Don’t own a gun and never will. But I have no problems with responsible people having them and using them appropriately.
Brilliant politics, terrible public policy. Go after a “relatively” small group of individuals – lawful and responsible gun owners – in order to court a demographic the Liberals need to hold onto to remain in power – the "well-educated [sic] white-collar urbanites".
The Liberals know exactly where all the legal and registered handguns are (including Matt’s) thanks to the gun registry so they probably have a pretty good idea of what ridings the owners live in, and what their political leanings are (and I know that there are gun owners across the political spectrum).
But the Liberals have done their math, and have targeted a small group of law abiding individuals who probably live in ridings the party has written off anyway. And they have done this to target their base in the big cities like Toronto, Vancouver and Montreal.
I am willing to bet that the next step is to ban semi-automatic handguns (maybe leaving an exception for .22 cal) and institute a mandatory buyback as they are now pledging to do with the “assault style weapons”. But they will do this later, because they will want the press coverage generated from such an announcement during the next election campaign.
For goodness sakes Matt just run for the conservative party already it is clear you have drank from many of their glass bottom tankards.
Another reason why this is pure politics is that this was done in response to sth that didn't even happen in Canada. It has always bothered me that events in USA have such an outsized influence on the Canadian politicians and media's narratives and actions. (Think Roe v Wade recently).