Canadian Firearms Journal - August 2008 by NAftional Firearms Association

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West Edmonton Mall

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Handguns

Shotguns

Ruger Single Six ................. $495 & up

Mossberg c/w pistol grip ........................................................................$475 & up

Ruger MK III SS ............... $450 & up

Beretta Extreme I ......................................................................................... $1680

Ruger SRH 480 ........................... $850

Benelli M2 MX4 Camo ............................................................................... $1569

Springﬁeld Armory GI 45 ...................... Springﬁeld Armory XD 40, 9 45 ............................................ $825 & up Baby Eagle Hardchrome ............. $899 Glock 17 ...................................... $825 Beretta NEO’s ............................. $395 HK USP ................................... $1295 Sig Sauer P226 ......................... $1195

Riﬂes Stevens Model 200 ...................... $365 Tikka T3 Synthetic DM .... $675 & up Savage 111 c/w 3-9x40 DM ............................................ $695 & up Sako 95M Synthetic SS DM.... $1499

Canadian

Firearms Journal Greetings from Head Office Summer is well on its way, so hopefully everyone is enjoying the nice weather. Elza, Bev and Diane all had some vacation time, so they’ve come back rested, revitalized and ready to tackle almost anything. We had another very productive and enjoyable day with our latest guest, Sheldon Clare (BC president). Thanks Sheldon for sharing knowledge and insight with us. Florence has accepted a full time position, so she will be leaving us. Thanks Florence, for all your hard work. We wish her well in her future endeavors. Please keep all phone calls and e-mails coming and if you do not receive a reply quickly, please re-send or phone again. Drop in and say hello anytime you are in Edmonton. Staff at NFA Head Office

Mission Statement Canada’s National Firearms Association exists to promote, support and protect all safe firearms activities, including the right of self defence; firearms education for all Canadians; freedom and justice for Canada’s firearms community, and to advocate for legislative change to ensure the right of all Canadians to own and use firearms is protected.

Inside this issue Regulars

On the Cover

This issue examines Prohibitions, why they are not effective, and offers up realworld alternatives for the likes of Toronto’s Mayor Miller, who just doesn’t get it.

Caution! Technical data and information contained in this magazine are intended to provide information based upon the limited experience of individuals under specific conditions. They do not detail the comprehensive training, procedures, techniques, and safety precautions that are necessary to properly carry out similar activities. Always consult comprehensive reference manuals before attempting any similar activities. Any printed reloading data may contain printing errors and so is used entirely at the risk of the reader. It is the responsibility of all hand loaders to check factory reloading manuals for the specified components in use. Canada’s National Firearms Association has no ability to control the conditions under which any published information may be used and therefore assumes no liability for use or misuse of published reloading information. The contents of the Canadian Firearms Journal are copyrighted and may be reproduced only when written permission is obtained from the publisher.

From the Editor’s Desk ...............................................................6 Christopher di Armani President’s Column .....................................................................8 Blair Hagen Vice President’s Column ...........................................................10 Sean G. Penney Letters to the Editor ..................................................................12 Gun Culture...............................................................................16 Christopher di Armani Legal Corner .............................................................................18 Clive Edwards Bruce Montague Case Update ..................................................20 Christopher di Armani Megan Tandy Update ................................................................22 Internet Destinations .................................................................25 The International Front .............................................................30 Dr. Gary Mauser Self-Defense ..............................................................................34 Clive Edwards Old West Armory .....................................................................40 Jesse L. Hardin Women & Guns ........................................................................44 Jane Gaffin Youth Development ..................................................................46 Frank Hutter Kids & Guns .............................................................................48 Kathy Jackson Politics & Guns .........................................................................56 Ian Jefferson Liberty ......................................................................................62 Vin Suprynowicz Preserving Our Firearms Heritage ............................................64 Garry & Sybil Kangas The Last Word ...........................................................................66 Christopher di Armani

Features The Mayor Who Couldn’t Shoot Straight ....................................7 Patti MacAhonic The Great White Huntress..........................................................23 Troy Peters A Picture Never Lies ..................................................................24 Christopher di Armani Prohibitions ... The Facts ...........................................................26 Book Review: Home Invasion Prevention .................................33 A Mule Deer Story .....................................................................52 John Noakes Toronto Mayor Wants Guns Banned ..........................................54 Dave Chappelle Preparing Your Game for the Taxidermist .................................60 Bob Shell International Defensive Pistol Association ................................65 Christopher di Armani

by Christopher di Armani

This edition confronts some fundamental flaws with the way public policy is developed in Canada. The way it works currently is this: a politician takes their pet idea and rams it down the throat of his constituents, completely disregarding all research and evidence contradicting his “pet idea”. Toronto’s Mayor Miller, like Allan Rock before him, is exactly that type of polician. His insistence on placing the responsibility for Toronto’s inner-city gun crime on the likes of you and me flies in the face of all logic and facts. Later in this issue you will read excerpts from the report “Prohibitions”, edited by John Meadowcroft, and published by Britain’s Institute for Economic Affairs (IEA). Meadowcroft examines prohibitions from the standpoint of economics and property rights. His position is one I agree with: the state has no right to tell an individual what they can or cannot do in relation to their own private property. Several authors give their take on the Toronto “handgun ban” with points of view I’m sure you will find interesting.

Today’s United Nations conveniently ignores Article 3 of the UN Declaration of Human Rights, which states quite clearly “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and securityof person.“ Like Mayor Miller and Premier McGuinty here at home, the UN Gang sincerely believe it is better to die defenceless under the UN flag than to defend yourself under no flag at all. Vin Suprynowicz is back with another installment of his column on liberty, this time pointing out the failure of banning handguns around the world. He does this in the style we’ve come to love: slapping the stupid in the face with the cold hard facts! The Bruce Peninsula Sportsmen’s Association has a program for introducing new shooters to our culture. Their program is a model every club across the country can adopt, the implementation of which will do more to preserve our culture and heritage than any letter to a politician. After all, the more voters we have, the louder our political voice will be.

Writer Bob Shell explains how to prepare your game hide for taxidermy, a timely message given hunting season will soon be upon us.

Clive Edwards’ second installment of his series on School Shootings is at the heart of this issue of CFJ. This time he’s delving into school shootings outside of North America.

Kamloops resident John Noakes gives us an excellent overview of his last deer hunt, and his article serves to remind us of one of the major reasons many of us own and use firearms.

Jane Gaffin is back with another installment of “Women and Guns”, this time slamming those of her sex that would ban her means of self-defense.

Jesse Hardin takes us on another wonderful trip into the past, dropping us into a buffalo hunt in the 1800’s. Jesse’s command of language paints, as always, an amazing picture of what it would have been like to actually “be there”.

Professor Gary Mauser gives us the latest on the United Nations’ plan to disarm civilians around the world and what we can do to help stop them.

August / September 2008

Kathy Jackson teaches us how to instruct our young ones on what to do if they come across a firearm and there is no adult around. This month’s “Gun Culture” profiles a fascinating and inspiring young woman from Williams Lake, BC. who, I’m sure you will agree, serves as a role model not only for her children, but for us all. Enjoy!

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by Patti MacAhonic

The

Mayor Who Couldn’t Shoot Straight

It is small wonder that Toronto Mayor David Miller cannot get violent crime under control. He keeps taking aim at the wrong target.

nce again Mayor Miller has set his sights on the law-abiding citizens rather than the drug dealing criminal gangs responsible for the ongoing violence in his city. His proposal to try to regulate the distribution, manufacture, sale, storage and ownership of legal firearms will have no impact on gangs and violence but will have a major impact on those least responsible: Olympic and other competitors, sporting goods businesses who legally sell both firearms and ammunition, at least one major manufacturer, the Toronto tourist and hospitality industry and Toronto taxpayers. Mayor Miller feels that he is justified in taking aim at law-abiding citizens because he “feels” that legally owned firearms are a major source of the illegal firearms used by criminals. This is despite the fact police studies and StatsCan figures consistently show this to be untrue. Mayor Miller may feel that the shooting sports have no place in “his” city but the IOC would no doubt disagree. Shooting sports have been a part of the Olympic games since 1896 and there are 27 separate disciplines today. Olympians may be born but they must work their way up through the ranks to become international competitors. The closing of two major ranges will certainly affect competitors on all levels. Where will our future champions come from? Definitely, it will no longer be from Toronto. A number of large sporting goods distributors in Canada have the specialized warehouses required by Federal Law for the storage of firearms and ammunition in the Toronto area. All of these will be affected by Mayor Miller’s proposal. A few may chose to close completely; most however will be forced to relocate to more receptive cities.

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At least one of Canada’s major firearms manufactures, ParaOrdinance, is located within the area that Mayor Miller proposes to cleanse of all firearms. Para-Ordinance has an international reputation for manufacturing some of the world’s finest handguns. Here again we have a successful business that may well be forced to move. Unfortunately, they would most likely not relocate in Canada and those jobs will go elsewhere. All of this would happen without any reduction in violence in Toronto or elsewhere, because criminals will continue to do what criminals do. Ignore the law. It is incongruous that while Mayor Miller is telling the world that Toronto is a dangerous place to be, MacLeans magazine recently ranked Canada’s most crime ridden cities and found that Toronto ranked far down the list in 26th place. It would appear that the Mayor’s obsession with gaining personal publicity by attacking Canada’s honest and law-abiding firearm owners comes at the cost of damaging the reputation of the city that he is supposed to represent.

The National Firearms Association has approximately 130,000 members across Canada. If you would like to reach each and every one of them, advertise in the

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August / September 2008

by: Blair Hagen, National President

President’s Column A

ccording to Albert Einstein, the definition of insanity is “doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results”. If this is true, then it appears that the lunatics are running the asylum in Toronto. Since the last federal election, Mayor David Miller of Toronto and Premier Dalton McGuinty of Ontario have been running a non-stop campaign trying to force the federal government to ban handguns. Fortunately, the Conservative federal government is taking a dispassionate view of the issue, has examined the facts, and concluded it is not in the interests of public safety to pursue such a ban. A national handgun ban was a major platform in Liberal Prime Minister Paul Martin’s re-election effort in 2006. His handgun ban promise went over like a lead balloon with voters who were already wary of the massive cost overruns and failures of the Liberal Firearms Act and universal firearms registry, and they didn’t bite. Paul Martin was defeated on January 23rd 2006, ending over a decade of Liberal rule in Ottawa.

August / September 2008

It seems neither Miller or McGuinty learned anything from that lesson. On April 28th, Toronto City Council adopted a resolution banning handguns within city limits. Now, it isn’t actually a ban on handguns, since Toronto has no jurisdiction over firearms law. That is a matter exclusively for the federal government. The City of Toronto cannot ban or confiscate any registered firearm from a licensed owner. So if you legally own handguns or any other type of firearm in Toronto, don’t worry you can’t be forced to hand it in or surrender it, despite Mayor Miller’s rhetoric. They have, however, done the next best thing. The motion that was adopted, along with the symbolic handgun ban, calls for the shutting down of certified target ranges on city property. That includes the historic CN Gun Club at Union Station. Furthermore, Toronto will move through zoning changes and bylaw amendments to drive all remaining firearms related businesses out of the city and prevent new ones from opening. All of this is to send the message to gang bangers and criminals that “guns are bad”.

The Toronto gun ban is the epitome of style over substance. To Mayor Miller and his cronies, sending the message that City Hall doesn’t like guns is more important than actually implementing measures that will reduce gun crime in that violence-plagued city. Toronto City Councillor Adam Vaughan, supporter of the ban and the initiative, opined: My favourite letters are the ones being sent from the U.S.. Gun owners that are now urging a boycott of Toronto. Considering that most of the problems with guns on our streets emanate from south of the border, I couldn’t be happier. If all it took was closing a couple of shooting ranges to stop gun-toting Yanks from coming to our city, maybe we should have shut the doors on these clubs years ago. (Toronto Star, June 30 2008) You get a clear sense of what is driving the gun ban campaign in Toronto; not a sincere desire to end violent crime, but rather elitism and puerile anti-Americanism, and a rather juvenile desire on the part of Mayor Miller and his cronies to punish what they view as a particularly disliked minority, score points with gun-shy urbanites, and

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look like they are doing something about gun crime when they are not. Thankfully, the sentiments expressed by Mayor Miller and Toronto city Council are no longer representative of mainstream thought on firearms in Canada. Contrast them with this statement from Mayor Sam Sullivan of Vancouver. There’s no doubting the sincerity of his grief and anger. Indeed, outrage is an appropriate response when people kill, especially when they kill people they’ve never met out of indifference to human life. But outrage isn’t a solution. It’s an emotion that leads people to assign blame, as quickly and loudly as possible. Outraged people need rallying cries, and rallying cries must be short and simple. But the social factors that create crime are not simple. A ban on all handguns would certainly not end gun crime. It wouldn’t root out violence, or alter gang behaviour, or topple the markets in illegal drugs and weapons. Mr. Miller is wrong to oversimplify the problem. Tragedies happen for many reasons. If all guns were “banned” in the sense that it was against the law to own any kind of firearm, there would still be shootings. We need politicians who are willing to keep asking why that’s so.

(Ottawa Citizen January 23rd 2008) Federal, provincial and civic politicians across Canada have actually learned from the “gun control” mistakes of the past, and are eager to not to repeat them. David Miller’s war on lawfully owned firearms is not about

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preventing violent crime, it’s about the social re-engineering of our culture. Not just the culture of Toronto, but all of Canada. In the UK and Australia, “gun culture” is a negative term. It’s used to describe the phenomena of young men using firearms in violent criminal activities. The war on the UK’s real and honorable firearms culture has gone on for decades, and the gun control lobby and social engineers in that country have succeeded in diminishing the law-abiding firearms owner as a political consideration. In Australia, it has been more recent but equally as effective. The UK and Australia have been the laboratories for these civil disarmament and social reengineering efforts. In Canada, that hasn’t happened - yet. Despite the best efforts of the civil disarmament lobby and elements of the mainstream media in this country, our national firearms culture has not been destroyed to the point where the Canadian firearms community is seen, as is asserted by Mayor David Miller, as an archaic artifact or merely a source of weapons for the criminal element. Canadians haven’t bought the false promises of handgun bans and firearms registration, despite the imposition the former Liberal government’s Firearms Act that we live under today. However, if our firearms culture isn’t maintained and expanded, if it isn’t defended in Ottawa and the provincial capitals, what happened in places like the UK and Australia can and will happen in Canada.

excesses of the Liberal’s 1995 Firearms Act were not accounted for. If the “gun control” lobby in Canada and the civil disarmament movement worldwide can remove the concept of legitimate ownership and use of firearms from Canadian society, that dark road our cousins in the UK and Australia were forced down will be our road too. That means we must all remain vigilant against incursions against our historic right to arms, a Canadian civil right. A right brought to this continent and recognized in the British North America Act. It’s too late for David Miller and the majority of Toronto City Council. Despite all the facts and all the evidence that gun bans are failed social policy, they will continue their war to remove lawfully owned firearms from Toronto, end legitimate firearms activities, and pillory responsible folks who harm no one and abide by the law. The only solution is to defeat them at the polls and replace them with representatives who understand that legally owning a firearm doesn’t make you the problem. Using a gun in a violent criminal manner does.

That has already happened in Vancouver, in Ottawa, and it can happen in Toronto too, but only if we all stand up and be counted on election day.

It’s planned. However, the immense trouble and controversy caused by the introduction of universal firearms registration and the

Canadian Firearms Journal

August / September 2008

by Sean G. Penney, National VP Communications

Vice President’s Column

t has been quite an interesting couple of months since my last column. Toronto Mayor David Miller launched a broad attack on not just legal handgun owners, but all legal firearms owners, shooting sports, gun shops, gun clubs and any industry that promotes the lawful use of firearms in any way. Miller and his gang are in this fight to win and if that means playing fast and loose with the truth, then they’re willing to make that “sacrifice.” He has succeeded in convincing the city council of Toronto to support this ban, despite all evidence to the contrary that shows gun bans simply don’t work. (see excerpt from the report Prohibitions later in this issue.) Like so many gun grabbers before him, Mayor Miller seems far more concerned about “appearing” to do something about the criminal drug and gang problem his city now contends with, rather than actually taking measures to address the root cause of so-called “gun” crime. Mayor Miller deliberately fails to recognize the impact that limited economic and educational opportunities for inner city youth, along with the break-down of the nuclear family, has had on his city. Tragically, such conditions have served to create a generation of disaffected youth and when coupled with the growing drug trade, the easy money it offers, and the attendant violence it brings with it we are left with a community in crisis. Obviously these are but a few of the extremely complex socio-economic variables that play a part in Toronto’s highly publicized gun-related shootings. 10

August / September 2008

When you factor in the criminal activities of organized crime, outlaw biker gangs and your basic unsocialized miscreants, you get a city with a criminal problem, not a “gun” problem. While it is not politically correct to broach such subjects, they are still real problems that require real solutions - not sound bites and platitudes from another slick politician whose primary interest is his own re-election. David Miller, instead of offering the youth and indeed all citizens of Toronto some real hope that he had the solution to his city’s crime-related gun violence, has chosen to target law-abiding gun owners instead! It is certainly the politically correct choice! Canada’s legal gun owners are, de facto, the most law-abiding of citizens. We must pass detailed police background checks and investigations in order to legally obtain a firearms license. As such, the logic involved in stripping such individuals of their rights in order to eliminate the criminal use of illegally smuggled handguns by gangs and drug dealers on Jane & Finch Streets escapes me. It boggles my mind that average Canadians are so willing to sacrifice the rights of fellow citizens without so much as an honest thought, let alone an honest debate on the subject. However, what is most distressing are the comments made by a number of Canadian gun owners and hunters who were all supportive of Mayor Miller’s gun ban…or at least until they found out that the gun grabbers weren’t limiting themselves to “just handguns” this time! It is “fair-weather” friends like this who do a disservice to

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all responsible firearms owners, no matter the type of firearm they own, collect, or shoot. The many thousands of Canadian shooters and hunters who continue to propagate the fallacy of “good” and “bad” guns remain disengaged from this debate in the mistaken belief that their guns and their rights aren’t threatened. Amazingly, some go so far as to even accept the gun-grabber’s “facts’ as truth and willingly buy into the complete fiction that banning “bad” guns will solve all problems and keep their “good” guns safe! Sorry folks, it doesn’t work like that. Mayor Miller’s most recent attack on ALL GUNS should serve as a wakeup call for all gun owners from St. John’s, Newfoundland to Vancouver, British Columbia and all points in between! Speaking to many hunting and outdoors groups on this topic, I’ve always warned my audience that Canadian shooters and hunters must stand united against this constant attack on our rights. Some will argue that Canadians do not enjoy the same constitutional right to keep and bear arms as our American cousins, as set-out in their 2nd Amendment. (An individual right recently reaffirmed in a landmark 5-4 decision by the U.S. Supreme Court.) That argument may be technically correct, however, until the Liberal Governments of Pierre Trudeau, Jean Chrétien & Paul Martin, Canadian gun owners enjoyed protections that were even broader and more comprehensive; rights, in fact, that were actually established and codified almost a millennium ago. At the time, individual rights to firearms ownership were guaranteed to every Canadian under our system of English Common Law. Eighteenth Century English scholar, William Blackstone traced the right to own

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arms as far back as the 11th Century and the reign of King Canute.

the law dies and the rule of law along with it.”

By 1181 and the Assize of Arms, the right to own arms had been established and recognized as an “ancient” right and would later be the basis of the English Bill of Rights.

Mayor Miller has decided to trample the rights of law-abiding gun owners in the City of Toronto. The National Firearms Association, along with other stakeholders, is actively fighting this miscarriage of justice.

It is these same “ancient” rights that would later be used as the basis of both the Canadian and American legal systems and interestingly enough, helped form the basis of the American 2nd Amendment!

All Canadian gun owners must stand united with our fellow hunters and shooters who are now bearing the brunt of this outrageous attack on fundamental civil liberties.

As such, Canadians enjoy the civic right to “armes for their defence” – a fact repugnant to the Liberal ethos, and so we saw the introduction of 1995’s Bill C-68, which is now enshrined as part of our Criminal Code.

Despite broadly held perceptions to the contrary, guns have never safeguarded liberty, it has always been the person wielding those arms, men and women of courage who were willing to stand against injustice and oppression.

Liberal Senator Sharon Carstairs, commenting on the implementation of the Firearms Act, described the Liberal Government’s “gun control” scheme as the lynchpin in their plan to “socially re-engineer Canada.”

Canadian gun owners will ultimately be the architects of their own destiny in just a few short months.

Canadian gun owners became their target of choice. Radical leftist gun grabbers like Wendy Cukier and Heidi Rathjen quickly found accommodating champions in the form of Allan Rock and Anne McLellan, and direct financial backing from the Liberal government in the form of hundreds of thousands of taxpayer’s money! Noted journalist Lorne Gunter, writing for the Edmonton Journal, picked up on Senator Carstairs offthe-cuff comments and noted that not only would Bill C-68 serve to re-engineer Canada, the Liberal’s seemed to believe it would, more importantly, target male gun owners, and make them more docile!

Pundits and political commentators expect another federal election before the end of the year. That election will present all Canadian gun owners with the opportunity to reclaim what Blackstone called an “absolute right.” Our choice is simple. We can return to Ottawa a friendly, MAJORITY Conservative Government; or a hostile, leftwing Liberal Government intent on finishing the job started by Allan Rock and Jean Chrétien. It is up to each of us to put aside petty differences and prejudices and accept individual responsibility for safeguarding our liberties and rights as gun owners… absolutely!

Gunter’s most important warning came later when he wrote, “…when lawmakers trample centuries-old liberties without an overwhelming social good, in return then respect for

Canadian Firearms Journal

August / September 2008

Letters to the I am an NFA member and I’ve just received the June/July issue of the Canadian Firearms Journal (looks very interesting). On page 35, there is notice proclaiming “When Seconds Count, Cops are Just Minutes Away. Stay Alive Until Help Arrives. CARRY”. I would like to ask how the NFA could encourage carry when as far as I know it is illegal in Canada? I would support and encourage carry if it were legal but I don’t understand how the NFA can publicly tell folks they should carry. Has something changed with respect to our laws? Where would I find the rules that govern carry (or it’s prohibition) in Canada. Sincerely, many thanks... Brian G.

Thanks for your question Brian. Section 20 of the Firearms Act provides for the legal carry of a firearm for personal protection in Canada. The Regulations that provide for the administration of Section 20, however, are onerous and unreasonable, and effectively subvert the purpose of Section 20. The Regulations say, “the life of (the) individual…is in imminent danger…. “ This is, realistically, too high a bar to the effective application of Section 20 for the purpose of self defense outside the home. By the time a woman leaving transit to walk home alone, or a handicapped person using a cash machine at night determines that they are in imminent danger it is too late to process the paperwork. A firearm is needed immediately. At a minimum, the word, “imminent” needs to be dropped from the regulations. 12

August / September 2008

The Regulations further state, “(in) danger from one or more other individuals”. This implies that the identity of the potential imminent assailant is known. While this may be true for a woman or an employer with a restraining order naming an estranged spouse or employee, this offers no consolation to the average citizen who might be hard pressed to even identify their assailant after the fact, assuming they survive at all.

Section 20 of the Firearms Act

“Police protection is not sufficient in the circumstances”. Unless you are a politician or highly connected politically and can ask for and receive around the clock police protection, police will always arrive too late to prevent injury or death.

(a) to protect the life of that individual or of other individuals; or

“The possession of a restricted firearm or prohibited handgun can reasonably be justified for protecting the individual or other individuals from death or grievous bodily harm”. This should be self evident. Violent criminals nearly always choose victims that are physically weaker than themselves. The only hand held tool that can dissuade a physical attack is a handgun. A cell phone is an ineffective means of calling “someone with a gun” (the police) to help you in your time of need. The only effective means of stopping a physical attack is to have a handgun rather than a cell phone in your hand. To believe otherwise is to believe you can never be accosted by a criminal and if you are, the criminal is not serious about harming you. If enough Canadians demand a carry permit as allowed by law, the regulations can be changed to meet the requirements of that demand. It must be remembered that our representatives in parliament are just that – our representatives. We must never allow them the arrogance of thinking their job is to be government’s representative to us, the citizens of Canada.

An individual who holds a licence authorizing the individual to possess restricted firearms or handguns referred to in subsection 12(6.1) (preDecember 1, 1998 handguns) may be authorized to possess a particular restricted firearm or handgun at a place other than the place at which it is authorized to be possessed if the individual needs the particular restricted firearm or handgun

(b) for use in connection with his or her lawful profession or occupation. Authorizations to Carry Restricted Firearms and Certain Handguns Regulations PART 1 Circumstances in Which an Individual Needs Restricted Firearms or Prohibited Handguns for the Purpose of Section 20 of the Act Protection of Life 2. For the purpose of section 20 of the Act, the circumstances in which an individual needs restricted firearms or prohibited handguns to protect the life of that individual or of other individuals are where (a) the life of that individual, or other individuals, is in imminent danger from one or more other individuals; (b) police protection is not sufficient in the circumstances; and (c) the possession of a restricted firearm or prohibited handgun can reasonably

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Editor be justified for protecting the individual or other individuals from death or grievous bodily harm.

Canadian

Firearms Journal The Official Magazine of the

National Firearms Association

Lawful Profession or Occupation

Published by the National Firearms Association

3. For the purpose of section 20 of the Act, the circumstances in which an individual needs restricted firearms or prohibited handguns for use in connection with his or her lawful profession or occupation are where

Editor........................................................................CFJEditor@nfa.ca Christopher di Armani

(a) the individualâ&#x20AC;&#x2122;s principal activity is the handling, transportation or protection of cash, negotiable instruments or other goods of substantial value, and firearms are required for the purpose of protecting his or her life or the lives of other individuals in the course of that handling, transportation or protection activity;

Accounts / Membership / General Info ................ membership@nfa.ca

(b) the individual is working in a remote wilderness area and firearms are required for the protection of the life of that individual or of other individuals from wild animals; or (c) the individual is engaged in the occupation of trapping in a province and is licensed or authorized and trained as required by the laws of the province. PART 2

Issuance

National President .........................................................(780) 439-1394 Blair Hagen natpres@nfa.ca National Vice-President Communication......................(780) 439-1394 Sean Penney natvpc@nfa.ca

Provincial Contacts British Columbia ............................................................bcpres@nfa.ca Sheldon Clare (250) 563-2804 Alberta................................................................................info@nfa.ca (780) 439-1394

Ontario ...........................................................................onpres@nfa.ca Bill Rantz (705) 385-2636 Quebec ...........................................................................pqpres@nfa.ca Phil Simard (514) 365-0685 Vice-President sab@nfa.ca Stephen Buddo (450) 430-0786 Nova Scotia .................................................................... nspres@nfa.ca Dave Udle (902) 567-3600

Questions? Do you have a question? Something you want clarified? Please send us a letter or an e-mail. We would love to hear from you. Letters should be directed to the Editor. Legal and political questions should be directed to the NFA Legal Department. Letters must include the Name, Address, and Phone Number of the sender.

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National Executive

Manitoba ............................................................................info@nfa.ca (780) 439-1394

4. A chief firearms officer shall not issue to an individual an authorization to carry a particular restricted firearm or prohibited handgun that

e-mail: info@nfa.ca

Legal Inquiries ................................................................. legal@nfa.ca

Saskatchewan ................................................................. skpres@nfa.ca Dan Lupichuk (306) 332-3907

Authorizations To Carry

P.O. Box 52183 Edmonton, AB Canada T6G 2T5

Advertising............................................................ Advertising@nfa.ca Clive Edwards (604) 250-7910

New Brunswick...................................................................................... Harland Cook (506) 459-7416 Newfoundland ................................................................natvpc@nfa.ca Sean Penney (709) 598-2040 Cathy Keane (709) 368-3920 Publication Sales Agreement 40050578

National Firearms Association Box 52183 Edmonton, Alberta Canada T6G 2T5 www.nfa.ca

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Tel: (780) 439-1394 Fax: (780) 439-4091 info@nfa.ca

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13 1

is needed in the circumstances described in section 2 or paragraph 3(a) unless the chief firearms officer determines that

(d) if the individual requires it for the purpose described in paragraph 3(a), that the individual wear a uniform.

(a) the individual has successfully completed training in firearms proficiency and the use of force that is appropriate for using the firearm in those circumstances; and

7. (1) A chief firearms officer who issues an individual’s authorization to carry shall revoke it if

(b) the firearm is appropriate in those circumstances. SOR/2004-267, s. 2. Renewal 4.1 For the purposes of subsection 67(1) of the Act, the manner in which an authorization to carry is renewed in the same as the manner in which it can be issued. SOR/2004-267, s. 2. Number of Firearms 5. An authorization to carry may authorize the possession of one or more restricted firearms or prohibited handguns for the purposes of section 20 of the Act. Conditions 6. A chief firearms officer who issues an authorization to carry shall attach to it the following conditions: (a) if the individual is authorized to possess more than one restricted firearm or prohibited handgun for the purposes of section 20 of the Act, that the individual carry not more than one of them at a time; (b) that the restricted firearm or prohibited handgun be carried in a holster; (c) if the individual needs it for the purpose of a lawful profession or occupation, that the individual notify the chief firearm officer if the individual ceases to be employed or engaged in the lawful profession or occupation or changes employers; and

August / September 2008

Revocation

(a) the individual’s licence to possess any of the firearms referred to in the authorization is revoked or reaches its expiry date; or (b) the chief firearms officer becomes aware that the individual’s physical or mental state has deteriorated to an extent that may affect the safety of the individual or of any other person. (2) A chief firearms officer who issues an individual’s authorization to carry for the purpose of a lawful profession or occupation shall revoke it if the individual ceases to be employed or engaged in the lawful profession or occupation. Notice of Refusal or Revocation 8. (1) If a chief firearms officer decides to refuse to issue an authorization to carry or to revoke an authorization to carry, the chief firearms officer shall give notice of the decision to the applicant for or holder of the authorization to carry. (2) The notice must include reasons for the decision. (3) A chief firearms officer need not disclose any information the disclosure of which could endanger the safety of any person. 9. (1) A notice of a decision to refuse to issue an authorization to carry is sufficiently given if the notice is addressed to the applicant for the authorization to carry at their address that is set out in the application for the authorization or, if the individual has advised the chief firearms officer of a change of that address, at the new address, and it is

(a) sent by mail; or (b) transmitted by electronic means that can produce a paper record. (2) A notice of a decision to revoke an authorization to carry is sufficiently given if the notice is addressed to the holder of the authorization at their address that is set out in the application for the authorization or, if the individual has advised the chief firearms officer of a change of that address, at the new address, and the notice is (a) delivered personally, at any time that is reasonable in the circumstances; (b) sent by registered mail or by courier; or (c) transmitted by electronic means that can produce a paper record. (3) The notice is deemed to be received (a) on the day of delivery, if delivered personally; (b) on the fifth working day, excluding Saturdays and holidays, after (i) the postmark date, if it is sent by mail, and (ii) the date of shipment on the waybill, if it is sent by courier; and (c) on the day of transmission, if sent by electronic means. SOR/2004-267, s. 3. COMING INTO FORCE 10. These Regulations come into force on December 1, 1998.

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by Christopher di Armani

Sheila Gruenwald

orn in Williams Lake, B.C., Sheila Gruenwald is the only Canadian born child of American immigrant parents, and the youngest of five siblings. She does a variety of teaching and leadership ‘things’ to make money but her real goal is “to work as little as possible, make great money and play with my kids.” Among those many activities are leadership and team-building workshops for organizations across Canada. Sheila is also a CORE teacher/examiner, Canadian Firearms Safety Course instructor, Strength Deployment Inventory Facilitator and recently published her first book, “The Journey Out: The First Steps To Reclaiming Your Life!”, which is available on Amazon.ca. CFJ: What is your first memory of firearms activities? Sheila: One of my best and first memories of firearms activities was hunting Marmots with my brother on a farmer’s field. We would count the runners, flippers and the drop deads. My brother was probably the one who gave me the greatest memories with shooting. One time when we were out shooting he wanted to challenge my target ability so he put shotgun shells on a log. He told me that if I could shoot them off the log he would give me $20.00. The first shot was nowhere close to the target, the second hit just below and the third shot that shell clean off... he still owes me the $20.00 come to think about it!

Krysteele, my 13-year-old daughter owns a beautiful calico cat named Angel. We tease her lots and tell her the cat is here primarily to exercise the dogs. The truth is... the cat makes her way through the crowd of dogs with no problems.. she has put them in their respective places.

CFJ: Do you have any pets, and if so, what kind and what are their names?

My youngest son Sheldon has taken to collecting crickets and guns...

Sheila: Animals have always been a part of my life. I currently have three dogs – a two year old Whippet/ Australian cattle dog named Shilo, and two year old black lab/boarder collie/pitbull crosses – Tagarik and Maggo.

CFJ: Have you taken any firearms training courses, and if so, which ones and why?

Technically, Tagairk belongs to my oldest son, Alexander, who is 18 and Magoo belongs to my 16 year old son Kurtis 16

but the dogs have elected me pack leader so they’ve become MY dogs.

August / September 2008

Sheila: I grew up with firearms and hunting as a ‘normal’ way of life. When I got married we did not own guns; my husband was an East Indian immigrant and was not comfortable or familiar with firearms. Since his passing

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I have begun to collect guns and now own a variety of calibers for both small game and large game hunting.

both land and air I understand the need for the public to be educated in many aspects of appreciating the wilderness.

I am also collecting calibers for my kids to shoot. The most prized one at the moment is a .303 British that my 11 year old son shoots. After his first shot at the range he turned around with eyes glowing and huge like the sun, looked straight at me and said, ‘That was the coolest moment in my life.’ He is hooked for life.

In my opinion hunting is just a tip of being an outdoor enthusiast, it also includes the responsibility to protect wildlife, habitats and educate and inform the public of the benefits of hunting responsibly.

It is that excitement that motivates me to keep my children involved in the outdoors, hunting and fishing aspects of life. My passion also flows over to teaching others to enjoy and be safe in the wilderness. As a member of Search and Rescue

The best way I saw to influence these aspects of hunting was to become an instructor and share my passions with others. Instructing also gives me a chance to hear the views and opinions of others. I am the personality type to take those concerns and see if there can be something done to make changes and improvements. I am currently seeking out a suitable volunteer position with the BC Fish and Wildlife organization in hopes of continuing my involvement and influence with hunting. CFJ: Why do you hunt? Sheila: I think it is pretty clear the reasons I hunt – I love the outdoors and I love fresh meat. Knowing I am providing my kids with healthy food and a healthy lifestyle that does not include the TV (which we haven’t had for 17 years). My ‘baby’ is a .308 Mossberg, bolt action. My favorite game to hunt is bear. I don’t know why but there is an excitement when hunting bear like no other. Bear has also provided the most exciting hunting experiences for me, both when I come home with a harvest and when I come home fatigued with only a smile. I think my first bear harvest was one of the best. We were above Pinas Lake and had been hunting for a day and a half by quad. We had basically given up when I saw the bear on the side of the road peering out at us. As I slid off the quad, squatting down to take off my bright yellow, crinkly rain jacket, I crawled up the path to get in position for my shot. It seemed to take forever as the bear kept swaying, checking me out, in and out of my scope. The shot finally came; the bear ran a short distance and expired. He provided 75lbs of pepperoni and a beautiful rug that hangs on the foot of my bed. CFJ: What’s the next gun on your wish list? Sheila: The next gun I want is an 870 Remington Defender. I think this will Continued on page 29

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August / September 2008

by: Clive Edwards

Legal Corner

Canada and the Heller Decision

he Heller decision of the U.S. Supreme Court (decided June 26, 2008) struck down Washington, D.C.’s handgun ban and mandatory storage laws as unconstitutional. Justice Scalia, in his majority decision stated, “The Second Amendment protects an individual right to possess a firearm unconnected with service in a militia, and to use that arm for traditionally lawful purposes, such as selfdefense within the home.”

A society that adopts a constitution, he says, “is skeptical... that societies always ‘mature,’ as opposed to rot.”[3] Scalia notes further that many important social advances, such as women’s suffrage, were achieved not by judicial fiat but constitutional amendments — whose adoption, Scalia adds, is slow and cumbersome by design. The idea is that amending of the Constitution allows for democratic change as opposed to top-down rule by judges.

Justice Scalia further states:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Antonin_Scalia

“The handgun ban and the trigger-lock requirement (as applied to self-defense) violate the Second Amendment. The District’s total ban on handgun possession in the home amounts to a prohibition on an entire class of “arms” that Americans overwhelmingly choose for the lawful purpose of self-defense. Under any of the standards of scrutiny the Court has applied to enumerated constitutional rights, this prohibition—in the place where the importance of the lawful defense of self, family, and property is most acute—would fail constitutional muster. Similarly, the requirement that any lawful firearm in the home be disassembled or bound by a trigger lock makes it impossible for citizens to use arms for the core lawful purpose of self-defense and is hence unconstitutional.“

Would that we had a bench full of Scalias on our Supreme Court of Canada. Instead, we have the most flagrant interpreters of a “Living Constitution” in history. I am beginning to suspect that a degree in Social Engineering rather than an honest degree in Constitutional Law gets our Supreme Courtiers their jobs.

Antonin Gregory Scalia took his seat on September 26, 1986, appointed by Ronald Reagan, becoming the first Italian-American Justice on the Supreme Court of the United States. Justice Scalia is a vigorous proponent of textualism in statutory interpretation and originalism in constitutional interpretation, and a passionate critic of the idea of a Living Constitution. Scalia vigorously opposes the idea of a living constitution, which says that the judiciary has the power to modify the meaning of constitutional provisions to adapt to “the evolving standards of decency that mark the progress of a maturing society.” For Scalia, this idea misunderstands and negates what he calls the “anti-evolutionary purpose” of a constitution.

August / September 2008

Of course, the framers of the U.S. Constitution were all men of tested integrity; most had risked their lives and property in committing deeds to back up their words and beliefs. The gang of social engineers and fellow travelers who framed us with their mischief would not have risked missing dinner if the job at hand truly had been a Canadian Charter of Rights rather than an insincere seduction for the simple-minded. The citizens of Canada and the United States derive our right to firearms and self-defense from the very same source – our common British cradle. As Scalia noted: In a 1780 debate in the House of Lords, for example, Lord Richmond described an order to disarm private citizens (not militia members) as “a violation of the constitutional right of Protestant subjects to keep and bear arms for their own defense.” In response, another member of Parliament referred to “the right of bearing arms for personal defence,” making clear that no special military meaning for “keep

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and bear arms” was intended in the discussion. Between the Restoration and the Glorious Revolution, the Stuart Kings Charles II and James II succeeded in using select militias loyal to them to suppress political dissidents, in part by disarming their opponents. Under the auspices of the 1671 Game Act, for example, the Catholic James II had ordered general disarmaments of regions home to his Protestant enemies. These experiences caused Englishmen to be extremely wary of concentrated military forces run by the state and to be jealous of their arms. They accordingly obtained an assurance from William and Mary, in the Declaration of Right (which was codified as the English Bill of Rights), that Protestants would never be disarmed: “That the subjects which are Protestants may have arms for their defense suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law.” This right has long been understood to be the predecessor to our Second Amendment. By the time of the founding, the right to have arms had become fundamental for English subjects. Blackstone, whose works we have said, “constituted the preeminent authority on English law for the founding generation,’ cited the arms provision of the Bill of Rights as one of the fundamental rights of Englishmen. It was, he said, “the natural right of resistance and self-preservation,” and “the right of having and using arms for self-preservation and defence,”

and 1770’s, the Crown began to disarm the inhabitants of the most rebellious areas. That provoked polemic reactions by Americans invoking their rights as Englishmen to keep arms. A New York article of April 1769 said that, “It is a natural right which the people have reserved to themselves, confirmed by the Bill of Rights, to keep arms for their own defence”. They understood the right to enable individuals to defend themselves. As the most important early American edition of Blackstone’s Commentaries (by the law professor and former Antifederalist St. George Tucker) made clear in the notes to the description of the arms right, Americans understood the “right of self-preservation” as permitting a citizen to “repel force by force” when “the intervention of society in his behalf, may be too late to prevent an injury.” St. George Tucker’s version of Blackstone’s Commentaries conceived of the Blackstonian arms right as necessary for self-defense. He equated that right, absent the religious and classbased restrictions, with the Second Amendment.

English game laws had abridged the right by prohibiting “keeping a gun or other engine for the destruction of game”. Thus, the right secured in 1689 as a result of the Stuarts’ abuses was by the time of the founding understood to be an individual right protecting against both public and private violence.

Tucker elaborated on the Second Amendment: “This may be considered as the true palladium of liberty . . . . The right to self-defence is the first law of nature: in most governments it has been the study of rulers to confine the right within the narrowest limits possible. Wherever standing armies are kept up, and the right of the people to keep and bear arms is, under any colour or pretext whatsoever, prohibited, liberty, if not already annihilated, is on the brink of destruction.” He believed that the English game laws had abridged the right by prohibiting “keeping a gun or other engine for the destruction of game.”

And, of course, what the Stuarts had tried to do to their political enemies, George III tried to do to the colonists. In the tumultuous decades of the 1760’s

Putting all of these textual elements together, we find that they guarantee the individual right to possess and carry weapons in case of confrontation. This meaning is strongly confirmed by the

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historical background of the Second Amendment. We look to this because it has always been widely understood that the Second Amendment, like the First and Fourth Amendments, codified a pre-existing right. The very text of the Second Amendment implicitly recognizes the pre-existence of the right and declares only that it “shall not be infringed”. “This is not a right granted by the Constitution. Neither is it in any manner dependent upon that instrument for its existence. The Second amendment declares that it shall not be infringed.” To read the full US Supreme Court Heller decision, please visit: www.supremecourtus.gov/ opinions/07pdf/07-290.pdf Despite the attempts of the social engineers in our midst to obscure our lineage, both Canada and the United States share a common mother – Britain. We derived acknowledgment of our Rights, as well as our culture of freedom and responsibility from a strong, healthy matriarch. We were both strong and healthy offspring. To claim we should more resemble the current Britain, a parent in her dotage and imbecility is maudlin sentiment at best, but more likely calculated disingenuousness. We must not let those who would shackle us with unjust laws steal not only our freedom but also the freedom of generations who would be denied their choice. “If it saves one life” would we have fought in 1776? World War I or II? How about now? “If it saves one life” is a timid, fearful whine. It is the sound-bite of victimhood. When push comes to shove, what are you willing to do to maintain or recover your freedom? Isn’t it time you put your shoulder to the wheel?

CanadianFirearmsJournal.com

August / September 2008

by Christopher di Armani

As preparations continue for his appeal, Bruce Montague recently received support from an interesting and unexpected quarter. Dr. Ignatius Piazza, founder of Front Sight Firearms Training Institute (see his ad on the back cover) contacted Bruce about his Charter Challenge. Dr. Piazza first heard about the Montague case via Katey Montague’s series of YouTube videos, and after following the link to Bruce’s website, learned more about his constitutional challenge of Canada’s Firearms Act. Piazza got on the telephone and called Montague. He wanted to find out from Bruce exactly what the case was about to determine whether or not he would offer his support. Satisfied, Dr. Piazza made an incredibly generous fundraising offer. For every person or business who donates $1,000 or more to Bruce Montague’s legal defense fund, Dr. Piazza will give the donor a free 4-day defensive handgun training course, valued at $2,000. While at first glance this appears to be crazy, a quick search of the web shows that Dr. Piazza has a long history of supporting causes and charities that he believes in. A visit to his philanthropic website (http://www. ignatius-piazza.com/) shows that, since founding Front Sight in 1996, he has helped dozens of charities and causes raise over $5 million. Ignatius Piazza is a valiant defender of our rights, a man who fully comprehends that Canadians get the civil right of “armes for their defense” from the same place he gets his 2nd Amendment rights. For more details of this amazing and generous offer please visit http://www.BruceMontague.ca. 20

August / September 2008

Katey Montague’s YouTube video site continues to be well-received by the community at large. Some of the individuals commenting hold the young Ms. Montague in very high regard. The comment below is from one such viewer of her videos: Hey there Fellow Freedom Warrior. I just want to say I’m sorry to hear of all that You are going though for Your God Given Rights. Listen, Keep Up The Good Fight and someday they will speak of You and Your nobility through out the Ages. Long After We’re all dead and buried they will speak of Katey Montague. It will be like that movie where there’s a woman teaching a history lesson 200 years in the future. They will say - “And that Children, is how a beautiful young woman named Katey Montague fought for her people’s independence, and even now, 200 years later we Canadians still enjoy the fruits of Liberty, the seed of which were planted by Katey so long ago.” Even after the adverse challenges that Katey and her family went through, she and her family overcame the adversity as she called upon her people and her valiant call was answered. It is much like what a Great American once said - “One man or woman with courage is a majority”. Truly that and more was Katey Montague. That is why this great 20 foot statue of her stands in Freedom Square in the heart of New Toronto. That’s what they will say about you Katey. As the great Thomas Jefferson said, “No free man shall ever be debarred the use of arms”. If you haven’t visited Katey’s YouTube site recently, please point your web browser to: http://www.YouTube.com/KateysFirearmsFacts/

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Megan Tandy Update 22

Summer Training

will spend a lot of my summer training time in training camps. Camps have several benefits: usually we choose a camp location in order to take advantage of a particular facility, to be at a certain altitude, to train with other athletes, to see and roller-ski at sites where we will compete in the winter and, of course, to be on snow. The sooner we are able to begin training on skis the better so we often chase the first snow or spend time on glaciers when we can. One of my favourite things about training camps is the environment â&#x20AC;&#x201C; I am away from my friends, family, work and other normal distractions; as much as I love the distractions of everyday life, I am able to train much better with all of my focus on my training sessions, eating right, resting and sleeping enough, recovering and stretching and the little training tasks like equipment maintenance and dry firing. This contstant focus on my sport for a short period of time allows me to train as well and efficiently as possible. I love intense training but I am always grateful for the calmer week at home in between camps! I know for sure that I will be moving away from my home in Prince George to train with the National Team in Canmore, Alberta. I will also be spending some time in Squamish, BC with the BC High Performance Team there. These changes will give me better access to training resources that are not currently our usiness ard available to me in Prince George. I am looking forward to the new challenges ahead of me, and with the support of the National Firearms Association I am confident that I will represent our great nation in 2010!

August / September 2008

Y B C Could Appear Here! Interested?

Call us at (604) 250-7910 or e-mail us at advertising@nfa.ca

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by Troy Peters

The Great White Huntress

t was a dark and stormy night. That’s usually how the classic man vs. beast adventure begins. However, in this story it was an unseasonably warm day. Warm for the sub-tundra of the Canadian north. And instead of man, it was woman. The beast, however, remains the same. It was an unseasonably warm and bright day. There, much better. My girlfriend Robyn and I were camping on the north coast of Hudson’s Bay, a few hundred miles north-north-east of Churchill, Manitoba. Our local guide, an Inuit native by the name of Nuti, had more than his fair share of incredible tales, but this just might become his favorite. The three hours of semi-darkness Nuti called “night” here in the Arctic was taking a toll on Robyn and I, but by this, our fourth day in, we finally seemed to be adjusting. We were light-spirited, feeling optimistic about the day’s unknown adventure ahead. We were here, after all, to meet the last earth-bound man-eater alive. A beast so ferocious it’s been known to drag humans from their beds in the middle of the night. Here we were in the last stronghold of our most recent ice age. Glaciers long gone were evidenced by tracks of large stones moved through the ages. This was the realm of the polar bear, The Great White Hunter. We were the outsiders, and we were on his turf. Breakfast merely fueled our optimism, and we headed out from our base camp across the cool, yet sun-baked expanse of north tundra. Patches of snow and ice nestled in the ravines and in the shadowy sides of hills. Little vegetation other than moss, and lichen could be found. www.nfa.ca

Nuti pointed us toward a valley that put us directly in the mid-day sun, giving Robyn and I a form of snow-blindness. The white-grey ground appearing as bright as snow. Before too long we happened upon a fresh caribou kill and the telltale markings of a Polar Bear. We surveyed the area, knowing he wasn’t too far off. Seeing no sign of him, Robyn decided to walk over a ridge to relieve herself while Nuti regaled me with another hunting story as we rested on the ATVs. Suddenly a shot, loud as can be, rapidly followed by another. Robyn was a smart girl who knew to keep her rifle with her at all times, even when just steps away from the rest of our hunting party. In a flash Nuti was up and at the ridge, his gun ready. He dropped to a crouch at the ridgeline. Within a breath I was at his side. In milliseconds we saw the whole picture. The glare of the low sun shining off the frozen snow on the backside of the ridge had caused the original Great White Hunter, the polar bear, to blend in, unseen by Robyn. She had just removed her heavy jacket, turning back just in time to see his charge. She grabbed her Winchester Model 70, chambered in .308, and fired two shots in quick succession, point blank, and perfectly aimed. He dropped in front of her, 1,200 pounds of Polar Bear dropping at her feet, his last breath blown right in Robyn’s face. The Great White Hunter had finally met his match: woman.

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August / September 2008

by Christopher di Armani

A Picture

Never Lies The story on the preceding page, while fun and exciting, isn’t actually true. The photograph is not taken north-north-west of Churchill, Manitoba, but in a ravine just west of Williams Lake, British Columbia. The polar bear is not real, but a stuffed replica created for use in a movie. “Robyn” is in reality Dana, a lighting technician on the crew of the movie “The Thaw”, starring Val Kilmer (the brilliant actor in “The Doors” and “Tombstone”) and Canadian actress Martha MacIsaac. The crew was in Williams Lake filming a portion of the movie “The Thaw”, and finishes principal photography in their Langley studio mid-July. “The Thaw” is produced by Vancouver production company Anagram Pictures and is set to be released in early 2009. The movie is an eco-thriller, described by the producers as “about a deadly prehistoric parasite that is released when a Woolly Mammoth is discovered in a melting ice cap. Faced with a potentially global epidemic, four ecology students must destroy the parasite before it reaches the rest of civilization. One-by-one they are infected and one-by-one they turn on each other. Soon the survivors are left with only one choice - to make the ultimate sacrifice and burn everything to the ground... including themselves.”

August / September 2008

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Internet Destinations Good Humor: Diebold Accidentally Leaks the Results of the 2008 US Presidential Election

http://www.who.int/mental_health/prevention/suicide_rates/ en/index.html

http://www.theonion.com/content/video/diebold_ accidentally_leaks

Bill C-21: An Act to amend the Criminal Code and the Firearms Act (Non-registration of firearms that are neither prohibited nor restricted).

A resource site for the US Supreme Court Heller decision: http://www.nraila.org/heller/ IDPA Canada - home of training information and competition information http://www.idpacanada.com/ International Defensive Pistol Association (IDPA) http://idpa.com/ The Value of Civilian Arms Possession as a Deterrent to Crime or Defence Against Crime - Don B. Kates, Jr.

http://www2.parl.gc.ca/HousePublications/Publication. aspx?Docid=2333983&file=4 International Action Network on Small Arms. This organization is too modest. Anywhere in the world where gun rights are threatened, this group is involved... including Canada and the United States. http://www.iansa.org/about.htm International Association of Chiefs of Police www.iacp.org/documents/pdfs/Publications/ACF1875.pdf

http://www.panda.com/canadaguns/#respite

The Joyce Foundation of Chicago funded the forum of the International Association of Chiefs of Police. Bill Blair, Toronto Police Chief, shows up in Appendix C – Summit Advisors. Anthony Warr, Toronto Deputy Police Chief attended, as did at least one Toronto Police Inspector, along with ATF and nearly every G-3 (Gun Grabber Group) in the United States. Was the Toronto Police contingent there to learn how to grab guns from the Americans? Does Miller aspire to be a “Big City Boss” like Daley of Chicago?

World Health Organization suicide statistics. Since anti-rights proponents constantly harp on suicides, it is instructive to note that some of the highest suicide rates occur in “gun free zones”, better known as police states.

If the Canadian gun grabbers can go international, so can Pro Gun Rights groups. As a wise man once said, “if we don’t all hang together, we shall most assuredly all hang separately.”

http://homepage.usask.ca/~sta575/cdn-firearms/Kates/ crime-deterrent.html David A. Tomlinson, founder and president of the Canada National Firearms Association helped proofread, correct, and provided invaluable additional information for this web page. In explaining Canada’s firearms laws to Americans, the absurdities become self evident.

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August / September 2008

Prohibitions: Why outlawing particular goods and services is bad public policy and why Politicians like to.

he Institute of Economic Affairs (http://www.iea.org. uk) recently released a report titled “Prohibitions”, edited by John Meadowcroft. IEA granted CFJ permission to reprint excerpts of the report here to help educate us and our politicians about the folly of prohibitions, not just for guns, but for a whole host of societal problems. The report is 140 pages long, and every page is worth the read. Starting with an overview of “the harm principle”, Meadowcroft takes us through the history of prohibitions as they apply to drugs (both recreational and medicinal), boxing, firearms, advertising, pornography, prostitution, gambling, human body parts for transplantation, and alcohol. While bundling these subjects together may seem crazy, using economics and the harm principle to tie them together Meadowcroft makes a compelling case against prohibitions and for allowing free market forces to control that which some individuals believe is detrimental to others. This really is the key, as prohibitions always require one group of people telling another group of people what they may or may not do. The full report can be purchased directly from the Institute for Economic Affairs in hard copy form, or downloaded from their website in electronic form from http://www.iea. org.uk/record.jsp?type=book&ID=429.

the facts.

Prohibitions This collection examines prohibitions – the outlawing of the manufacture, distribution, sale or provision of particular goods and services by consenting adults. After this introduction, the book begins with an overview of the economics of prohibition and then the subsequent chapters analyze the prohibition of the following goods, services and activities: recreational drugs, in particular cocaine, heroin and marijuana; boxing; firearms; advertising; pornography; medicinal drugs; prostitution; gambling; body parts for transplant; and alcohol. The above goods, services and activities are all prohibited in some part of the world, and in some cases – such as those of alcohol, gambling and prostitution – in large parts of the world. The chapters in this collection are written by an international cast of authors from across the social science disciplines. The authors include economists, lawyers, political scientists, philosophers and sociologists, who have applied their expertise to the problems posed by the provision of these particular goods and services both outside and inside the law.

First, the relevant costs and benefits are far more than simply monetary – they include all the individual and social costs and benefits. Second, at its heart economics is the study of property rights and the consequences that arise from different regimes for the ownership of property. Owning a property title involves owning a bundle or collection of rights. A person who owns a property can do what he or she wants with it: they may use it, rent it, donate it, transfer it, sell it or even destroy it. If, however, another entity may prevent an individual from using their property as they wish, then that other entity has a partial right of ownership of that property. By assigning partial ownership rights in citizens to the state, prohibitions necessarily involve a diminution of individual liberty. People without the power to choose what they do with their bodies cannot be said to be as free as people with such a choice, and a society in which many activities are prohibited cannot be considered a free society. For this reason, prohibitions must be carefully justified. It must be shown that the benefits of prohibition outweigh the costs. Freedom is rarely lost in one dramatic incident, but is more commonly gradually taken away as many seemingly minor restrictions on personal freedom cumulatively take effect.

I urge you to purchase and/or download the full report, read it, then pass it on to your elected representatives. The guns you save might be your own!

Although the authors are drawn from throughout the social sciences, all have considered the economics of prohibition (broadly defined) within their contributions. The economics of prohibition implies an analysis of the pecuniary costs and benefits of prohibition, but it also entails much more than this.

August / September 2008

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Prohibition and the harm principle Prohibition is usually justified in order to prevent harm – the invocation of ‘the harm principle’. www.nfa.ca

The harm principle is derived from the classic account of the appropriate boundaries between actions that are of concern to the individual alone and those that are of concern to others that was set out by John Stuart Mill (1859 [1985]: 68) in his essay On Liberty. Here, Mill stated:

[T]he sole end for which mankind are warranted, individually or collectively, in interfering with the liberty of action of any of their number is self-protection. That the only purpose for which power can be rightfully exercised over any member of a civilised community, against his will, is to prevent harm to others. His own good, either physical or moral, is not a sufficient warrant.

To cross this dividing line between the individual and the collective is to assume that we know what is best for others better than they themselves do. But the ends that people pursue in life must be a matter for each individual, not for other people, to determine. It is wrong to impose our own preferences on others who may not share our assessment of the costs and benefits of different courses of action; to prevent other people from choosing their own ends is to deny their capacity for autonomous choice and ultimately to deny their very humanity. Furthermore, once the principle that autonomous individuals may be prevented from freely choosing actions that harm no one but themselves has been transgressed, the fact that there is no objective measure of what actions are harmful and therefore should be prohibited means that practically any intervention can be justified. Prohibition places markets into the hands of criminal enterprises Wherever the manufacture, distribution and supply of goods and services are prohibited organised crime syndicates will be alert to the substantial profits that can be made from their illegal provision. As Thornton and Bowmaker describe in Chapter 3, prohibition drives a â&#x20AC;&#x2DC;wedgeâ&#x20AC;&#x2122; between the cost of production and the final selling price, ensuring that those prepared to take the risk of supplying illegal goods and services can reap exceptional profits. In all the cases of prohibition discussed in this book â&#x20AC;&#x201C; from gambling to prostitution and

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August / September 2008

from medicinal to recreational drugs – there is extensive criminal involvement in the supply of illegal goods and services. Indeed, even where goods and services are not prohibited but are subject to punitive taxation, criminal organisations will seek to exploit the wedge between cost of production and final selling price, as in the case of the growth of tobacco smuggling and the sale of counterfeit cigarettes in the UK as taxes on tobacco products have risen in recent years. Organised criminal enterprises are one of the principal beneficiaries of prohibition. Just because the manufacture, distribution and sale of a product have been prohibited it does not necessarily follow that its manufacture, distribution and sale will cease. On the contrary, it is more likely that its manufacture, distribution and sale will move from the legal to the illegal sector. The costs of illegal supply are borne by the whole of society, as criminality becomes more profitable and therefore more attractive, innocent bystanders are caught in the (sometimes literal) crossfire between competing gangs and (as discussed below) police resources are devoted to combating organised crime. Prohibition criminalises people who would not otherwise be criminals Prohibition involves the creation of consensual crimes – that is, the criminalisation of acts voluntarily undertaken by consenting adults. It forces people who wish to undertake such acts outside the law and by so doing criminalises people who would otherwise be law-abiding. Prohibition diverts law enforcement resources away from conduct that harms third parties The enforcement of any prohibition involves a substantial direct financial cost. To detect, arrest, prosecute and finally punish those engaging in prohibited activities requires substantial resources for the police, the courts and other government agencies. To give an indication, the annual budget of the US Drug Enforcement Administration in 2006 was $2.4 billion.3 This does not include the separate costs of state police, customs, coastguard and court time also spent enforcing the US ‘War on Drugs’. Prohibition increases public ignorance An important justification of prohibition is that many people do not fully appreciate the likely consequences of their actions and for this reason, where ignorance is widespread, government should prohibit certain activities to protect the public. As Martin Ricketts and Geoffrey E. Wood make clear in their overview of the economics of prohibition in Chapter 2, however, by its very nature prohibition tends to increase public ignorance. Organised interest groups are crucial to the introduction of prohibitions

August / September 2008

The chapters in this collection show that prohibitions frequently result from the ability of organised interest groups to capture the policy process and impose their preferences on the rest of the population. These groups may represent a minority interest and a minority of public opinion, but their organisation, concentration and visibility mean that they are able to use the political process to impose their preferences on the majority who are not organised, and who are dispersed throughout society and less visible to policymakers. Prohibition almost never works and is almost always counterproductive The costs described above might be considered worthwhile if prohibition actually worked, but unfortunately empirical evidence suggests that prohibition almost never works and is almost always counterproductive. The prohibition of recreational drugs is again a striking example. In the USA, cannabis has been de facto prohibited since 1937, while in Holland it has been de facto legal since 1970 and today it may be freely bought and sold in licensed ‘coffee shops’. In 1997, of the US population aged twelve years and over, 32.9 per cent had used cannabis in their lifetime. In Holland, by contrast, the proportion was only 15.6 per cent. Although the difference is less marked when older population cohorts are separated and analysed, the evidence is nevertheless clear that cannabis use is greater in the USA where it is illegal than in Holland where it is legal (MacCoun and Reuter, 2001: 253). Legislation to ban the ownership of handguns and other firearms has been similarly ineffective in combating violent crime. In Chapter 5, Mauser shows that while the murder rate in England was fairly constant between 1974 and 1997, after handguns were banned in 1997 it rose dramatically from 11.2 murders per million people in 1997 to 15.5 per million in 2001. Mauser presents similar evidence from the Republic of Ireland and Jamaica, two countries that banned all firearms in the 1970s. Ireland banned firearms in 1971, a year in which there were ten murders in that country. Since 1995 there have never been less than 38 murders per year, and in 2005 there were a total of 54 murders. Jamaica banned firearms in 1974 when its murder rate already stood at a shocking 10 per 100,000 people. Since then the murder rate has continued to rise inexorably, not falling below 31 per 100,000 people since 1995. Mauser shows that there is no evidence that the introduction of gun control legislation reduces the murder rate or the overall rate of violent crime. Why should prohibitions almost always fail? A number of reasons can be identified. First, prohibition almost always leads to offsetting behaviour. Hence, just as the seventeenthand eighteenth-century window taxes led to houses with bricked-in windows in British streets, so punitive taxes on tobacco lead to cigarette smuggling and counterfeiting,

CanadianFirearmsJournal.com

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prohibition of recreational drugs leads to vast networks of illegal manufacture, distribution and sale, and the outlawing of prostitution leads to the provision of ‘massage’ and ‘escort’ services in grey markets. Just because government passes legislation to make something happen, it does not necessarily follow that it will. Second, for prohibition to be effective requires a level of government spending and interference in people’s day-to-day lives which is unacceptable in a free society.

Fourth, for reasons that are not well understood, prohibition very often appears to promote the very behaviour it is intended to eliminate. Filley (1999) has shown, for example, that attempts to prohibit smoking by US teenagers by restricting the sale of cigarettes to minors had exactly the opposite effect to that intended: in towns where additional restrictions on the sale of cigarettes were introduced, smoking among teenagers rose compared to its incidence in control towns where no new measures were introduced. Filley notes that similar results have been produced by interventions aimed at reducing teenage drinking and by attempts to reduce serious road traffic accidents by manipulating speed limits (ibid.). Exactly why prohibition should have this opposite perverse effect is not entirely clear, but it is probably a combination of the ‘forbidden fruit effect’ – whereby activities that are forbidden become more attractive, especially to young people – combined with offsetting behaviour. Prohibition, public policy and responsibility On the basis of the evidence presented in this collection, it would seem reasonable to propose that all actions without direct thirdparty victims should be legalised. In most cases legalisation would be a straightforward matter of repealing the relevant legislation. The legalisation of recreational drugs would probably necessitate the creation of a regulatory regime similar to that which presently governs the sale of alcohol in most countries to prevent sale to minors and to provide health information to consumers.

Continued from page 17

Third, prohibition very often fails because it addresses the symptoms rather than the causes of social problems. For example, gun control is not a solution to violent crime or a high murder rate because violent criminals are perfectly capable of illegally acquiring firearms or finding other means of killing people, for example with knives or fists. The reduction of violent crime requires a much more sophisticated public policy approach than simply seeking to prevent criminals from accessing one particular type of weapon.

make a wonderful addition to the hiking and fishing trips me and my family love to do in the regions where only bears and cougars dwell. After my 870 acquisition I am looking for a handgun. I have not yet settled on a particular gun but have been checking out the Springfield Armory 5” Tactical. CFJ: I highly recommend the Sig Sauer P220 (.45 ACP). You won’t be disappointed! CFJ: Are you active politically in terms of gun owners’ rights? Sheila: I have not yet become involved in this fight but it has been on my heart and mind to get in touch with those that are standing against the banning of handguns. I firmly believe in the right to bear arms, however. I believe the world would be a better place if everyone assumed you had a weapon. There would be less crime and I know I would feel safer as a single woman if I had a gun at my side.

To propose that the manufacture, distribution and sale of a particular good or service should be legalised is not to endorse that good or service or to advocate its consumption. Rather, it is to state that what consenting adults choose to do with their own bodies is a matter of individual conscience. It is possible to simultaneously believe that people should not consume a particular good or service and that that good or service should be legal; one simply believes that abstinence should be the result of individual choice, not government diktat. Indeed, given the ineffectiveness of most states in enforcing prohibitions, it is perfectly feasible that the consumption of a good or service will be lower within a society in which it is legal than within one in which it is illegal. www.nfa.ca

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by: Dr. Gary Mauser

ronouncements at the United Nations sway the opinions of people around the world. Unfortunately, too many of their opinions are influenced by shoddy research dressed up in scientific language; what we typically call “junk science”. Claims that firearms in the hands of civilians pose a grave threat to world peace and security once again dominated the discussion at the UN Biennial Meeting of States (BMS) this summer in New York. The meeting was to review proposals for dealing with Small Arms and Light Weapons (SALW). Anti-gun activists like the International Action Network on Small Arms (IANSA) support their bogus claim that more guns are linked inexorably with more death and violence primarily by using junk science claims based upon reports by the Small Arms Survey (SAS), a research group affiliated with the Graduate Institute of International Studies in Geneva, Switzerland.

SAS reports are very influential at the United Nations. Governments and policy-makers frequently rely upon the SAS as their principal source of information about the dangers of small arms. Surprisingly, one of the principal supporters of the Small Arms Survey is the Government of Canada. <NICOLE: Please make this highlighted line a text “shout-out”>

The problem of

Junk Science at the

United Nations

In their most recent report, Small Arms Survey 2007, Guns and the City, the SAS now claims that there are an estimated 650 million firearms in the hands of civilians, twice their previous estimate. The World Forum on the Future of Sport Shooting Activities (WFSA) was one of the few voices speaking out for the rights of civilian firearms owners at the UN. This summer, as the representative of the National Firearms Association, I was invited to present the findings of a study that I conducted with constitutional lawyer and criminologist Don B. Kates and

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I have produced a scientific critique of the research methods used by the Small Arms Survey. This critique is included in a new book, Shooting Sports Survey, Conservation and Sport, and argues the case for legitimate small arms ownership by civilians on an international scale. The editor, Julianne Versnel Gottlieb, made it available at the UN Biennial Meeting of States this summer. Participants willing to be open-minded got to see a very different picture of civilian firearms owners than the U.N. Meeting typically portrays. The SAS, in their report Guns and the City, allege that privately owned firearms pose a greater danger than firearms possessed by a government, but provide no empirical support for these claims. was recently published in the Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy. In this paper we analyzed publicly available data from United Nations studies and the Small Arms Survey to examine the link between civilian firearm ownership and rates of homicide and suicide. Our findings contradicted claims that countries where civilians own more firearms have higher murder and suicide rates. (The speech and the paper are posted on Dr. Mauser’s website, www.garymauser.net, or can be downloaded from CanadianFirearmsJournal.com) The claims made by the Small Arms Survey are easily open to the accusation of junk science. Wherever junk science is used in the formation or discussion of public policy it must be exposed.

The SAS attempts to hide this vacuity by confusing the readers with complex scientific language. Their efforts to portray civilian firearms ownership as dangerous are wildly exaggerated and riddled with conceptual confusion. In what appears to be a deliberate effort to mislead readers, the SAS equates responsible firearms owners with criminals, revolutionaries and terrorists, all of whom the SAS continually refers to as “civilians”. Gun violence, even though it is but a fraction of total violent crime, is treated as synonymous with violent crime and civil unrest. The SAS justifies their increased estimates of world firearm stock by claiming that they have greatly improved their estimation methods. Surprisingly, these improvements are never explained sufficiently to demonstrate their superiority. The key to the new methodology is said to be their “independent estimates” of the private firearms stock.

Table 2.1 The division of global firearms (millions) Category Law enforcement Military Civilian Global total

Low total 26 150 570 745

Average 26 200 650 875

High total 26 250 730 1,000

Proportion 2.5 - 3.5% 20 - 25% 73 - 77%

Notes: Law enforcement totals cover only known law enforcement agencies (See Small Arms Survey, 2006, ch.2). Military totals do not include older, non-automatic weapons. Civilian totals do not include craft production. Global totals do not equal the totals of the trhee categories, due to rounding. Percentages do not equal 100, due to rounding. Source: Annex 3; Small Arms Survey (2006, pp. 37,56) www.nfa.ca

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Despite their critical nature, no serious effort is made to show how these newer estimates differ from the previous methods used by the SAS which are merely “indirect techniques” or worse, generated from “a sense of feel”. The SAS claims that important information is to be found in the annexes; however, these remain unavailable more than a year after publication. For the first time, the SAS uses a simple linear model to estimate the number of firearms held outside of government. This model is far too simplistic to be useful as it relies upon a single independent variable: the wealth of a country. Such a model generates the non-threatening and totally unsurprising discovery that civilians in richer and more stable countries have more firearms than do those in poorer and less stable countries. Thus, their own data contradict their claims that the availability of firearms is associated with social problems. Anyone who wishes to keep informed about firearms around the world would be well advised to buy a copy of Shooting Sports Survey, as it includes a wide variety of authors giving detailed descriptions of healthy communities of firearms owners in countries around the world.

at restricting general access to firearms have failed to improve public safety, while Mary Stang and Carol Oyster examine how firearms ownership contributes to the personal safety of women. The battle against junk science continues, but it is not yet won. The mantra that the availability of small arms and light weapons represent a grave threat to human security continues to be touted as gospel in government circles.

In addition, respected scholars Colin Greenwood and Joyce Lee Malcolm analyze how gun laws that are aimed

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Junk science abounds in promoting other irrational fears, such as global warming and loons being poisoned by lead sinkers. The will to believe these myths persists despite reputable exposés from researchers such as John Lott, Dave Kopel and Don Kates. The pseudo science used to promote ideologicallydriven agendas such as global warming and the irrational fears of pesticides and lead poisoning have been exposed by Terry Corcoran, Larry Solomon and others in the National Post. If you are interested in doing further research, here are a few sources to aid your journey for the truth. Gottlieb, Julianne Versnel (Editor), Shooting Sports Survey, Conservation and Sport, Merril Press, Bellevue, WA 2008 IANSA, www.iansa.org/ Junk science, network.nationalpost. com/np/blogs/fpcomment/archive/ tags/Junk+Science/ Dave Kopel, www.davekopel.com/ John Lott, johnrlott.blogspot.com/ Gary Mauser, www.garymauser.net/ Small Arms Survey 2007. Small Arms Survey 2007, Guns and the City, 2007, Cambridge University, UK. SAS, www.smallarmsurvey.org

Home Invasion Prevention by Frank Hilliard $12.26 – available from www.lulu.com/content/2369363

ome Invasions are not something any of us like to think about. It’s a nasty part of 21st century living that we can all do without. The fact remains, however, they happen, and they happen to people who never expect it and aren’t prepared for it. As firearms owners, we might find ourselves more prone to being targeted for this type of crime simply because of the items we own. Taking necessary precautions is all part of being a responsible firearms owner, so taking 30 minutes to review our personal security is something we cannot afford to put off. Fortunately Frank Hilliard has made this task very easy for us. His booklet “Home Invasion Prevention” is a well-researched and wellpresented resource. “Police, Crowns and Juries in this country are remarkably consistent in saying that a man’s home is his castle (the castle doctrine), even though the general public doesn’t realize this”, says Hilliard, who gives examples where charges were either not laid, were dropped, or stayed, or where the home owner was found not guilty of an offence after using lethal force. Hilliard walks us, the reader, through the various kinds of attacks, and then presents simple and viable options for helping prevent them. He alerts us to the vulnerabilities of the common devices we tend to rely on, and offers excellent advice on replacing them with more secure options. His advice is complete, as well, covering apartment dwellers, rural and urban home-owners, and focuses a section specifically on homeowners with attached garages. He empowers the reader to quickly and easily develop a complete Home Response Plan. “The big point that I hope the book makes is that a home owner with a gun can provide an ‘evidence trail’ of the attack, as well as provide himself (or herself) with time to get his legally-stored gun, if he has an internal security gate. Smashing the gate, or door, is the evidence he can then take to court to say he, or someone else, was in immediate danger of death or serious injury, and was therefore forced to shoot.” If you are concerned about your security and the security of your family, this information-packed resource is highly recommended.

www.nfa.ca

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August / September 2008

School Shootings Outside North America: War, Terrorism and Unbalanced Individuals Worldwide, attacks on schools may be divided into three categories: War - whether declared or not, can be difficult to defend against because of the scale of the attack. Terrorism or the response to terrorism - can often be defended against, unless the state becomes involved and is willing to accept extensive collateral damage. Unbalanced individuals - can nearly always be defended against, primarily by allowing competent individual citizens to access the proper training and tools for the job.

War The earliest documented case I could find of a school shooting due to war occurred in 1968 in Viet Nam. The Gia Hoi High School massacre took place during the invasion of Hue during the Vietnam War by the Viet Cong. Afterwards 170 bodies were recovered from the Gia Hoi High School yard alone. Another case occurred on November 10, 1993 in Bosnia. Three to four bombs were detonated by the Serbian military at the school at Sarajevo. Several children and a teacher were killed in the attack, other children were wounded. In July, 1995 in Yugoslavia the Vuk Karadžic Elementary School was used as a concentration camp in the Yugoslav wars. Around 80 to 100 of those held there were shot at the school then later dumped at a nearby hill. This elementary school was also used as a torture site by the Serbian militias. It is not known how many of the victims were students. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_school-related_attacks

Terrorism Attacks on schools can be the result of terrorist or guerrilla action and the massacre may be at the hands of either the rebels or the government forces and often both. An example of the latter is the Beslan School Massacre in the Russian Federation when a group of Muslim Guerrillas took more than 1,200 school children and adults hostage on September 1, 2004, at School Number One (SNO) in the town of Beslan, North Ossetia. On the third day of the standoff Russian troops attacked in force. Casualties were 386 killed and over 700 injured. January, 2007 in Beirut, Lebanon. Four people were shot dead in clashes between pro- and anti-government activists and about 200 were hurt in the violence that flared after a scuffle between students at the Beirut Arab University. July 2007 in Islamabad, Pakistan brings us the example of the Lai Masjid Seige. Pro-Taliban students barricaded themselves in the Lal Masjid (Red Mosque) in Pakistan’s capital city. The mosque is attached to a religious school for women (the Jamia Hafsa madrasah) and a male madrasah. The Pakistani government sieged the mosque for 8 days, having numerous gun battles in heavy, room-to-room fighting until all the defenders were killed, captured, or had surrendered. Final score: 286 killed, 248 injured. Lest we think this sort of thing only happens “over there”, we must remember that on May 4, 1970, Ohio National Guardsmen opened fire on student protesters at Kent State University during an anti-Vietnam rally, killing four and wounding ten. Ten days later in Jackson, Mississippi, police killed two and injured twelve during student demonstrations against the Vietnam War at that university. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beslan_school_hostage_crisis

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http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A583812004Sep3.html http://www.bloggingbeirut.com/archives/958-Beirut-ArabUniversity-Clashes-Update-9.html http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lal_Masjid_siege http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kent_State_shootings http://www.may41970.com/Jackson%20State/jackson_ state_may_1970.htm

The Israeli solution – After Ma’alot The nation that has dealt most with terrorist attacks on schools is Israel. On May 15, 1974, three PLO gunmen entered the school compound of Ma’alot. They first murdered the housekeeper, his wife and one of their children. Then the terrorists took a group of almost one hundred children and some of their teachers hostage. The teacher in charge was one of the first to leap out the window, followed by some children, but eighty-five children and some of the teachers remained. The terrorists placed explosive charges at the front of the classroom. During the rescue attempt, the gunmen blew these explosives and sprayed the kids with gun fire. Twenty-five people died and sixty-six were wounded. At the time Israel had strict gun laws, a holdover from British colonialism, during which the British administrators did their best to prevent the Jews from owning firearms. After vigorous debate the government began issuing handgun carry permits to any Israeli with a clean record. All over Israel guns became pervasive in the schools. Teachers and kindergarten nurses now started to carry guns. Schools were protected by parents (and often grandparents) guarding the children on voluntary shifts. Fifteen- and sixteen-year-olds were trained in firearm safety.

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The message got around to the PLO groups and after a couple of infiltration attempts failed, the attacks against schools ceased for many years. This is not to say that Palestinian terrorists never target schools, however. In late May 2002, an Israeli teacher shot a suicide terrorist before he could harm anyone. On January 24, 2008 Gush Etzion high-school was attacked. Two terrorists entered a classroom where seven counselors and students were meeting. The counselors were at first confused. The confusion subsided when one of the terrorists stabbed a counselor who had reached for his own pistol. A scuffle ensued and both terrorists were shot dead. At least two other counselors had concealed handguns and training to deal with such incidents. Not long prior to this two recent graduates, David Rubin and Achikam Amichai, were hiking in the Hevron-area when they were ambushed by terrorists. They engaged the would-be-killers and saved the life of their hiking companion. On March 6, 2008 twenty-six year old Alaa Abu Dhein who reportedly had worked as a driver at the Mercaz HaRav Yeshiva (a religious studies school) entered the building carrying a box concealing an AK-47 along with several magazines, later firing as many as six hundred rounds. About twenty minutes after he started shooting, he was killed by a part-time student, Yitzhak Dadon, who used his personal handgun to deliver two shots to the head of the attacker. A police patrolman who arrived at the scene during the shooting remained outside in an effort to “control the situation”, mainly by preventing civilians from entering. Thanks to the prompt action of the policeman who remained outside and his refusal to engage the intruder, nine people died and ten were wounded before Yitzhak Dadon was heroically able to stop the attack. Israelis have a history of dealing promptly and lethally when it comes to protecting their own. One of the few

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ordered provincial governors to give teachers licenses to buy guns if they want to even though it would mean bringing firearms into the classrooms.” The A.P. article explained: “Pairat Wihakarat, the president of a teachers’ union in the three provinces, said more than 1,700 teachers have already asked for transfers to safer areas. Those who are willing to stay want to carry guns to protect themselves.”

instances where this was not possible was at the ironically named “Island of Peace”. On March 13 1997 the Feurst school from Beit Shemesh, Israel, was on a class trip to the “Island of Peace”, an area established in the Jordan Valley a year earlier . The joint Israeli and Jordanian tourist resort was under Jordanian rule. Ahmed Yousef Mustafa, a Jordanian soldier supposedly guarding visitors opened fire on the school children, killing seven 11-year-old girls and badly wounding others. The Israelis had not been permitted to take their firearms onto the Island, which was a gun free zone. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ma’alot_massacre http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News. aspx/125487 http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?cid=1204546422275 &pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?pagename=JPost%2 FJPArticle%2FShowFull&cid=1207159750208 http://www.cnn.com/WORLD/9703/13/israel.shooting. update/ http://teapot.usask.ca/cdn-firearms/Lott/Lott1.html

The Thai Solution Muslim extremists in Thailand’s southern provinces are carrying out a terrorist campaign seeking to create an Islamic state independent of Thailand, whose population is predominantly Buddhist. Most teachers are Buddhists, and they have been a key target of the terrorists. As reported by the Associated Press, “Thailand allows teachers in restive south to carry guns for protection” on April 27, 2004, “Interior Minister Bhokin Bhalakula 36

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Although Thailand’s government is extremely hostile to gun ownership in general, it has recognized that teachers ought to be able to safeguard their students and themselves. http://www.nationalreview.com/kopel/kopel200409022215. asp

Unbalanced Individuals: The British Solution Britain does not have a history of school massacres, despite having to deal with the Irish Republican Army and, more recently, Islamic terrorists. All events in Britain have been of the third type of school attack – that of unbalanced individuals. On June 17, 1994 Garnet Bell, a former pupil bearing a grudge, entered an assembly hall at Sullivan Upper School and used a flamethrower to attack students taking A-Level examinations. Six were injured; three seriously. On December 8, 1995, Headmaster Philip Lawrence was stabbed to death outside the gates of his school by 15-yearold Learco Chindamo at St. George’s Roman Catholic Secondary School in Maida Vale, London. On July 8, 1996 Horrett Campbell, a 33-year-old man with paranoid schizophrenia, invaded a Teddy Bears Picnic being held at St. Luke’s Primary School. He slashed three young children and four adults with a machete. Lisa Potts, a 20-year-old nurse, was awarded the George Medal for saving children’s lives despite suffering severe injuries during the attack. The “Big One”, for Britain, had occurred a few months earlier on March 13, 1996 in Dunblane, Scotland. Unemployed former shopkeeper and Scout leader Thomas Hamilton walked into Dunblane Primary School armed with

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Attacks on School Students, Teachers and Staff around the world since 1891 Dates 1891 - 1900 1901 - 1910 1911 - 1920 1921 - 1930 1931 - 1940 1941 - 1950 1951 - 1960 1961 - 1970 1971 -1980 1981 - 1990 1991 - 2000 2001 - Now

Totals:

Events Dead Injured Most Deadly or Injurious Event(s) of the Decade 1 0 5 70-year-old male fires shotgun at students in playground. Minor injuries. 0 0 0 0 0 0 1 45 58 Bath School Massacre (explosives). 1 2 0 Student shoots teacher for refusing to change grade, then kills himself. 1 1 0 Ohio State University frat brother shoots another at the Fraternity house. 2 7 21 Poe Elementary School (explosives – 6 dead, 9 injured). 6 206 77 Gia Hoi High School Massacre (Viet Cong - 170 dead). 7 43 89 Ma’a lot School Massacre, Israel (3 terrorists shoot 26 dead, 60 injured). 10 30 28 L’Ecole Polytechnique, Montreal (15 dead, 14 injured) 47 201 152 Vuk Karadžić Elementary School (Serbs kill 80 - 100) 72 864 1455 Bessian School Hostage Crisis (Chechen rebels - 386 deaths, 700 injured) Lai Masjid Siege, Pakistan (Army attacks militant students - 286 deaths, 248 injured) 148 1399 1885

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_school-related_attacks http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/125167

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two 9mm pistols and two .357 Magnum revolvers. He killed sixteen children and a teacher, and wounded 10 others before committing suicide.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Schengen_Agreement

This event led to the banning of handguns in the UK with the Firearms (Amendment) (No. 2) Act 1997, and eventually a virtual ban on all privately owned firearms in the country.

In October of 2007 the country with the third highest rate of firearms ownership, Finland, experienced its second school shooting. Eight people were killed and at least 10 others injured in a shooting at a school in southern Finland.

In Queen Victoria’s time, a mere three generations prior to Dunblane, Britain was the most prominent power in the world, ruling and administering much of the globe.

The gunman, eighteen year old Pekka-Eric Auvinen, shot himself in the head and later died from his wounds in hospital after killing five boys, two girls and the female principal of Jokela High School.

Although Britain controlled firearms severely in the colonies, at home Britain had no legal restrictions on firearms ownership. Anyone with the money and the inclination could purchase any type or quantity of firearm they wished. There were no bloodbaths or rampages. At the time, Britain was perhaps the safest country on the planet. Post-Victorian gun laws were designed to keep guns out of the hands of “the lower classes”, such as British communists and foreign anarchists, much as American gun laws of the era were designed to keep blacks and other minorities disarmed.

Finland

Mr. Auvinen uploaded a video to YouTube prior to his rampage and posted a manifesto on another website explaining, “This is my war: one man’s war against humanity, governments and weak-minded masses of the world.” If this isn’t rage against social engineering I don’t know what is. Sadly, most school shooters express similar sentiments.

Today, of course, the British communists and foreign anarchists have won. The once feared British Lion has become mutton on the hoof, thanks to laws that deprived citizens of both rights and responsibilities. While shootings haven’t happened in schools for a while, most of the gun crime in the U.K. is perpetrated by school age children who, not having a culture they can respect and identify with, are creating their own. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/School_shooting http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/7056245.stm

Switzerland Switzerland, the country with the most guns per capita in the world, has never had a school shooting. Shootings of any kind are extremely rare in Switzerland and are, in most cases, blamed on “foreigners”. Swiss children learn to shoot at shooting festivals held around the nation each year, and have done so since the 1600’s. It is likely because firearms are seen as a social good and shooting binds Swiss culture that abuse of firearms is so rare. This may be about to change, however. In November 2008 Switzerland ratifies the Shengen Agreement by which Swiss firearms laws will likely be brought into line with those of the rest of Europe. http://www.stephenhalbrook.com/articles/guns-crime-swiss. html

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The only previous school shooting in Finland occurred on January 25, 1989 in Rauma. A fourteen-year-old boy shot and killed two of his fellow pupils, both of them boys, during a lesson at Raumanmeri secondary school. Reportedly he tried to shoot a third boy but the bullet missed. It is unfortunate that we need to depend upon the attacker to miss, run out of ammunition or commit suicide in order to survive. This gives all the power to the perpetrator. Police seldom arrive in time to save lives. Many teachers, staff and mature students may balk at carrying a concealed firearm daily, but it is the only effective way to stop a violent attack before the attacker makes the decision that he has had enough and kills himself. http://left.wikia.com/wiki/School_Shooting_Timeline http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jokela_school_shooting

Clive Edwards’ next installment of this series will focus on school shootings in the United States, followed by a review of school shootings in Canada.

THE

By Matthew Wagner

JERUSALEM POST

Jews with guns

n the evening of January 24, (2008) Muhammad and Mahmoud Sbarna dressed in security-guard uniforms, armed themselves and set out on their mission. From their home in Beit Omer, a village near Hebron, the two made their way to Kibbutz Kfar Etzion. At about 9 p.m. they cut through the security fence that surrounds the kibbutz without setting off the detection mechanism and made their way to the Mekor Haim high-school yeshiva. “Good evening,” Shmueli Greenberg said as the two walked into a classroom where seven counselors and students were holding a meeting. Greenberg and the others quickly realized that something was wrong. The two men, speaking Hebrew with a slight Arabic accent, ordered everyone in the room to stand against the wall with their hands up. They approached Greenberg and Rafael Singer, another member of the group. Singer drew his pistol and shot but it jammed and Mahmoud jumped on him, stabbing him in the back. Meanwhile, Muhammad pounced on Greenberg. The two terrorists were outmatched: Elyakim Kovatch, who was also armed, took aim and picked off the two attackers as they struggled with Greenberg and Singer. Kovatch, Singer and Greenberg had received counterterrorism training from Mishmeret Yesha. Founded in 1988 by Israel “Izzy” Danziger, a 55-yearold immigrant from Brooklyn. , Mishmeret Yesha is a grassroots non-profit organization that helps more than 100 settlements throughout Judea and Samaria train and equip their own “rapid response teams” to meet the security challenges of living in the midst of a hostile Palestinian population. These teams receive M-16s and ammunition from the IDF, and bullet-proof vests, communications equipment, various military-grade paraphernalia and extensive counterterrorist training from Mishmeret Yesha. “Mishmeret Yesha’s training gave us the confidence we needed to draw our guns in time to stop those terrorists,” says Singer, who was slightly wounded. “I don’t know what would have happened if not for the training we received from it.” Link to the full article: http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Sa tellite?pagename=JPost%2FJPArticle%2FShowFull&ci d=1207159750208 Reprinted with permission.

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Buffalo Guns

magine yourself as you might have looked 140 years ago, clad in blood stained buckskins atop a Plains hilltop, sighting down a heavy barrel rested on pair of crossed sticks. Picture your shoulder suddenly and violently slammed backwards, and how almost as quickly the rest of an unwilling torso is compelled to follow. At the sound of the muzzle’s blast tall grasses two feet to the front of you part

like a biblical sea. Small seed-eating ground birds flutter upwards briefly before settling back down to their own hunt for food. Ravens or crows – you can’t tell which – complain about the sound even as they zero in on the smell of spilt blood. No matter how big or how braced you are, the kinetic force of the “Big Fifty” is irresistible. You recover just in time to witness the effects of its 457 grain bullet, ideally sending the targeted buffalo to its knees.... but this time missing cleanly, throwing up an angry cloud of dust at the startled animal’s feet. The word most often used to describe such recoil is “punishing,” though in truth the effects are far more traumatic at the other end. Even at 500 yards the force of the big slug is sufficient to

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punch deep into your well muscled quarry, and powerful enough to penetrate most barricades that an enemy might hide behind. Your well cared for rifle came with double-set triggers, which means that by compressing the main spring with one, the second “hair” trigger would then release the hammer with a minimal amount of pressure and movement. At these kinds of ranges, one has to make the most of every bought or gifted advantage. In your case this includes a special 14 pound Sharps with a particularly stiff barrel for improved accuracy, a tang sight graduated out to 1000 yards or more, and a pair of stout sticks to brace your aim. You notice none of the other buffalo have run off yet, and so you give it another try. Buffalo were generally easy to spook, their dense muscles and thick skulls requiring a telling wound. While individual animals were dropped by

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rounds as light as the .44 rimfire in the Henry repeater, the remainder of a herd was likely to stampede off at the first sound of a shot. Hunts in the early days were therefore most often made on horseback, riding alongside the bolting beasts and firing one handed from the saddle... hence the archaic term for these hunters: “buffalo runners.” Muskets and rifles were specially shortened for this purpose, by both Indians and Anglos. Some even preferred a heavily loaded Colt percussion revolver for this purpose, giving them multiple rounds as well as increased control of their speeding mounts.

Cody then handed him his veteran trapdoor Springfield “Lucretia Borgia,” permitting the ecstatic visitor his first kill. He’d take another 6 before the two day shoot ended, including at least one successful attempt with a handgun. It wasn’t long, however, before professionals saw the advantage of taking bison from a stand instead of horseback. In time most professional

and the nearest individuals last. In this way an entire cluster could sometimes be killed in a single session, and the grumbling skinners didn’t have to range as far in order to collect the furs. A new breed of long range rifles were required for this highly specialized purpose, and for purposes of power and accuracy only the solid single shot designs would do. This left out the well-liked trapdoor Springfields so common after the war, due to their inability to handle the higher pressures of more powerful rounds. A cottage industry soon built-up around the conversion of martial and civilian market Sharps rifles into full fledged “buffalo guns.” Such work would likely include affixing an extra heavy barrel to their already strong actions, the addition of adjustable peep sights to their tangs, and the occasional fitting of a an exaggerated “Scheutzen” style butt-plate that locked the 10 to 15 pound rifle more firmly to the shoulder.

In 1867 the Ballard company, manufacturers of America’s first metallic cartridge breechloader, expanded its line to include configurations suitable for bison. The first sizable Western Newly offered chamberings buffalo hunts by Anglos included the .44-100, .46were organized to provide 100 and .50-100 By that a steady supply of meat to time however two other arms the thousands of laborers were firmly entrenched in the laying track for the spreading buffalo camps of the West. A group of Sharps and Ballard carrying buffalo hunters pose railroads. One young hunter One of the most important for a pre-hunt portrait in old Denver, the four with matching so employed went on to cartridge belts likely belonging to a hunting club and the of these was the Remington become the most famous single shot rolling-block rifle fellow in buckskins most likely being their guide. frontiersmen and showmen with a thumb-activated breech of all time: William “Buffalo block, popular with numerous Bill” Cody. When Duke Alexis of Western huntsmen including the hide-hunters settled on shooting from Russia visited America in 1872, ill-directed George A. Custer. Nor a fixed position. To avoid frightening Cody was assigned to help fete and was it employed exclusively for the whatever was left of a closely massed guide the enthusiastic 21 year old.... procurement of meat. group, they’d fire from as far away along with enough wine and spirits from their quarry as wind speed, During the James/Younger Raid on to stock a Chicago bar, numerous cartridge ballistics, new sights and old Northfield, a brave citizen used his other “colorful” scouts, and 500 army eyes would allow. Any animal that Remington hunting rifle to kill Bill personnel including the 2nd Cavalry’s began showing signs of nervousness Chadwell and wound Cole Younger regimental band! Mounted on Bill’s was axed as quickly as possible, before in the hip. Introduced in 1866, this horse Buckskin Joe, the Duke emptied his or her excitement started alarming sturdy and accurate arm was produced the cylinders on two S&W revolvers the others. The experienced shooter in a wide variety of chamberings without toppling a single animal. would drop those farthest away first,

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August / September 2008

for us to set up a stand and crossedsticks the way our ancestors did, to harvest healthy meat as a replica Big FIfty roars and smokes again!

Jesse L. “Wolf” Hardin is an antique firearms historian, a prolific artist, and

ranging from .32 Long to the buffaloworthy .45-70 and .50-70 centerfire rounds. In 1874 they released a .5070 version with a 30” barrel intended specifically for the hide market, weighing about a half pound more. That same year Carlos Gove of Denver began producing underlever conversions of rolling-blocks. These gave the shooter additional leverage for the ejecting of stuck cases, something of a problem with any black-powder arm that’s not cleaned every few shots, but it had no real advantage over the king of such arms: the civilian variations of the dependable Sharps. The Sharps Model 1874 sporting rifle became the standard by which all others were judged. The company designed cartridges that proved optimal for use on the Plains and were chambered by other firms including Ballard. Popular among the runners were the .40-50 and .40-70, with their ballistically superior long slender bullets, as well as the tried and true .50-70. The .40-90 and .44-90 also saw some use, after proving their worth at the Creedmore 1,000 yard target range in 1872. By 1876 the smaller and faster .40’s and .45’s were outselling all the rest. But be that as it may, the most famous of their proprietary rounds was the “Big Fifty,” a 1/2” long .50-90 load. A Sharps thus chambered quickly came to be considered the “cadillac” of all buffalo guns, with notable hide hunters putting it to such deadly work that it earned the secondary sobriquet of “poison slinger.” 42

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By the 1870’s buffalo also suffered competition to the large numbers of cattle being introduced. The clash now was not only between Indians and settlers, but between the wild frontier and the needs and dictates of civilization itself. The last large successful hunt by a group of Indians occurred in 1881, a year when the Blackfoot took some 80,000 skins. In April of 1883 those same bands looked high and low, and yet came back with only six! In two short years the remnants of the once seemingly endless herds had all but disappeared. Soon the only bisonbased industry was the gathering of their bleaching bones, for sale to fertilizer factories and the carbon works. There had once been up to 100 million buffalo in the Great Plains of the U.S. and Canada alone, but by 1760 hungry colonists had killed every buffalo east of the Appalachians, and 130 years later there were only around 500 left in the entire U.S.

an entertaining Old West presenter and storyteller. His book Old Guns & Whispering Ghosts (www.OldGunsBook.com) was his opportunity to put his lifelong study of American history and antique firearms to use, telling the tale of the Old West. His articles have appeared in over a hundred magazines including “Shoot!,” “Guns,” “Grey’s Sporting Journal,” “Mother Earth News” and the “International Arms & Militaria Collector.”

The intervention of conservationists and game ranchers have since brought back the buffalo from the very edge of extinction, affording modern hunters an opportunity to cull specimens from the close to 40,000 bison found in various private herds. Thanks to them, it is now possible

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August / September 2008

by Jane Gaffin

For effective guncontrol, use both hands This article was originally published in the Whitehorse Star. December 12, 2003, and was posted on various websites. WHITEHORSE, Yukon -- It was God who made women but Colonel Colt made us equal. Yet gun-control fanatics like Sarah Brady, Barbara Streisand, Janet Reno, Rosie O’Donnell, Hillary Clinton, Diane Feinstein, Barbara Boxer, Carolyn McCarthy, Wendy Cukier - some who pack concealed weapons for personal defence or employ body guards - want the public to believe all women support their bilge about “gun control” making the world a safer place. High calibre ladies who are busier practising than preaching, proclaim that if you want real gun control, use both hands. If the hypocrites have their way, they will promote the passage of jackass laws until all guns and ammunition are ripped from the hands of decent, honest, conscientious, respectable citizens. Then, as with prohibition of anything, the arms will go underground and fall into the hands of the rogues, fools, thugs and bootleggers, the very sort whom peaceable citizens need protection against. Then the do-gooders will bray for the passage of more jackass legislation so demur damsels won’t get hurt on the ice picks and knives they are forced to stash under their pillows or slip up their sleeves. What women need to be safe is a nice little pistol. It can be concealed inside a handbag or beside the bed in the cavity of a hollowed-out Bible. (It’s an honourable use of those about-to-be-destroyed Good Books that moralizers censored from Alberta hospital bedsides for fear immigrants of other faiths might be offended.) Meanwhile, bureaucrats continue blathering about gun registration reducing crime and leading to greater public safety.

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One day, a young man visited the firearms office. The firearms officer was paid to espouse the wonders of how registration was a public-safety measure. The customer listened a while, then replied, “Dan, you and I both know that’s a bunch of bulls--t.” That is about the sum total of what the Marxist-Leninist social-engineering sham is worth. The feds didn’t know what the gun registry was supposed to do and didn’t care a whit if it worked or not. They just wanted the cumbersome, tax-grabbing, make-work project implemented. Otherwise, why set up a national registry in an obscure place like Miramichi, New Brunswick, without any checks and balances on the system? The estimate to date of the taxpayers’ cost for trying to license gun owners and register every blessed gun is nearly $2 billion. Millions of guns are still unregistered and sections of the obscene Firearms Act is still being phased in. Does anybody feel any safer? A November (2003) news release from Garry Breitkreuz, member of Parliament for the Yorkton-Melville riding in Saskatchewan, disclosed one reason why the gun registry cost so much: The government, in its wisdom, paid twice for the registry’s computer system. “This is disgraceful considering that the new company is being paid to provide computer services and programs that the Department of Justice already paid $227 million to EDS Canada to provide,” said the (then) official Opposition’s critic for firearms and property rights. It’s well-known that the registry has served only to expand bureaucracies while trouncing our cherished civil liberties

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with an ill-conceived program that has opened up dark and dangerous avenues where only the lawless tread.

batons, pepper spray, police duty belts, body armour and gas masks.

The registry is blamed for setting people up to be robbed. Professional and amateur computer hackers enter the database, learn where firearms are located, then burglarize a place for specific goods without guess work.

Is this a surprise? A gun trafficker, who has an order for a specific piece, puts in a request with a police officer who accesses the gun registry to find who might have a prohibited or collectible item no longer attainable through commercial channels.

A retired RCMP staff sergeant was targeted for a house break-in on Vancouver Island last January (2003). Steve and Judy Vatamaniuck told the Alberni (B.C.) Valley Times they believed the criminals used the national firearms registry to locate and steal his collection of hunting rifles, shotguns and revolvers. All the firearms were registered and said to be secured with trigger locks, steel cable and locked inside an approved gun safe. “Gun owners are really running scared lately, especially since it was revealed that thousands of files have gone missing from the databank,” Mrs. Vatamaniuck told the Times.

A case is concocted against an unsuspecting firearms owner, a surprise raid is pulled on his home, all his firearms are seized and criminal charges are laid. A backroom deal may be bargained with the defence lawyer who is part of the legal crowd. The state will offer to stay procedures in exchange for the defendant’s forfeiting of his Lilliputian Special or Snake Charmer 202. The owner may relent without a fuss to avoid a costly court case and the possibility of a criminal record and/or jail term.

“I’ve spoken to several people just in our neighbourhood who have been targeted in the past several months. It just doesn’t make sense that our government is making it easier for organized criminals to get their hands on weapons that have been registered by law-abiding citizens.” If that example sounds like the registry is a countermeasure to public safety, how about the next scenario? Several years ago, hundreds of guns went missing from the Toronto police confiscation vault. After the initial “for show” flap, nothing was said or done. Why? The biggest known black marketers in guns are police officers. Neither they nor government prosecutors and judges are apt to lose their privileges to own guns. Valuable firearms of collector or prohibited status which are seized through raids and end up the subjects for court proceedings are not necessarily destroyed if the defendant is found guilty. As per s. 491(1) of the Criminal Code, the guns are disposed of as the attorney general directs. Translation: Those employed on the inside track have the opportunity to buy, divvy or trade the spoils among themselves. Last May (2003), the Ottawa Citizen reported a veteran Ottawa police officer, a senior RCMP officer and a heroic firefighter were among 10 men charged with 121 criminal offences ranging from gun trafficking to theft to fraud. A network was putting stolen handguns, rifles and police issued ammunition on the street. Also seized were knives,

Other victims, who won’t “deal with the devil”, force the state to prosecute. The crafty government will win the case (s) by hook or crook, eventually ending up with the desired firearms, anyway. Last month (Nov/03), a public-policy paper titled The Failed Experiment: Gun Control and Public Safety in Canada, Australia, England and Wales was released by the Vancouver-based Fraser Institute. Author Gary Mauser, a Simon Fraser University professor, has once again blasted the national gun registry. “The Canadian experiment with firearms regulation is moving towards farce,” he wrote.

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by: Frank Hutter

Aiming to increase membership Women and Junior Shooters Welcome in Bruce Peninsula Sportsmen’s Association

ecently, members of the Bruce Peninsula Sportsmen’s Association (BPSA) became aware that the average age of their members was rising dramatically. Formed in 1965 as a conservation-minded, non-profit organization, the BPSA quickly became known for their great work with programs such as fish hatcheries, shooting programs, tree planting, stream rehabilitation, and other conservation initiatives. However, it was time to create renewed awareness and interest among the area’s 8,000-plus residents, so the volunteers came up with other ideas to attract the next generation of enthusiasts. The association built a first-class indoor handgun range, where beginning shooters receive top level, one-on-one coaching with a rangemaster. This instructor’s main job is to ensure that safety is the top priority. Another initiative is the junior shooting program, which is specially designed to appeal to younger people. Again, the overriding emphasis is always on safety, and each learner is matched with a personal rangemaster. Lessons are kept short, lively and fun, teaching the proper handling and use of .22-calibre rifles. Junior shooters attend for eight weeks, and at the end, receive awards and trophies that reward their safety knowledge and skills. More than 500 young people have attended this program, with a few of the early graduates now returning as full-fledged members of the BPSA. Some of them have even gone on to become instructors, safety officers and rangemasters once they are of legal age. Besides the .22-calibre rifle initiative, junior members are also able to learn the finer points of archery. Under the guidance of certified instructors, they can practice all winter on an indoor range and in the nice weather, take advantage of the outdoor grounds and woods to shoot at Styrofoam three-dimensional targets. To hone their skills, they shoot 46

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Safety first. Rangemaster coaches a youngster on the line as he takes aim with his .22 rifle. at different ranges of targets without markers, so they learn judge the distances themselves. Several guests joined the club initially because of their interest in archery, then went on to expand into the other programs. Some have also become successful hunters by harvesting white-tailed deer with bow and arrow. Recently, club members at the indoor shooting range also hosted students and instructors from the police foundations course at Georgian College in Owen Sound. Each participant was matched with a BPSA rangemaster, and familiarized with the .22-calibre handgun. They received a basic safety course, all about the mechanics of the handguns, and how to shoot them. Besides helping people who will eventually become law enforcement workers, the exposure was beneficial in demonstrating how

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Frank Hutter, head instructor, demonstrates the safe handling of firearms to a small breakout group of children before giving them oneon-one instruction and going out onto the active range.

safe and well-managed a proper range is. Both the college instructors and students greatly enjoyed the experience, and appreciated the opportunity to learn in such a fun environment. They plan to return with another class of students later this year. The handgun range group actively competes in Midwestern Ontario Handgun League competitions, and recently held a Cowboy Action Shoot which was greatly enjoyed by all. The association also implemented a ladies’ shooting program, geared to introducing women to target shooting and hunting pursuits. They have a competition team, and one of their finest handgun shooters has come through this program. Women are welcomed and encouraged to take part in all areas of the BPSA, and some also take part in the archery program and in outdoor workshops. Through Women Out-of-Doors, in conjunction with the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters, they learn to fish, shoot rifles and bows, and also learn how to prepare wild game for the dinner table. The club originated from a desire to enhance the sport fishery, and to date, more than six million rainbow trout and brown trout, as well as salmon, have been released into Colpoy’s Bay by members. The BPSA also hosts a very well-received annual Frank Hutter addresses a new class of youngsters eager to learn all they can about firearm safety and accurate shooting.

A finger of land dividing Lake Huron and Georgian Bay in Ontario, Bruce County boasts 367 miles of shoreline, countless scenic vistas, world-famous sunsets, and an abundance of natural beauty. The Bruce Peninsula Sportsmen’s Association was formed in 1965, with headquarters near Wiarton, which is also the home of Wiarton Willie, the albino groundhog and famous weather prognosticator. Besides teaching firearm safety and skills, the group has been involved in many other conservation activities, including: Junior programs for shooting, hatchery, duck boxes and archery Deer feeding (up to 2,000 white-tailed deer) Wild turkey re-introduction (from 50 birds to more than 1,500 in five years) Tree planting projects Stream rehabilitation and spawning programs Building shoals to rehabilitate lake trout spawning areas Assist the Ministry of Natural Resources with stream watch (to prevent poaching) Stocking rainbow trout, brown trout, lake trout and salmon Women’s outdoor workshops, sponsored by the Ontario Federation of Anglers and Hunters Annual Community Living Day and fish fry Donate clubhouse and facilities for hunter safety education courses and area service clubs. Continued on page 51

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by: Kathy Jackson

The First Lesson Does your child know what to do if she comes across a gun?

eeping guns locked up is essential when you have kids, but I think most of us realize that as our kids grow, locking up the guns simply isn’t enough. Even if no one in your house ever goofs and accidentally leaves a gun out, the fact is that the bigger the kid gets, the more places she’ll go and the better the chance that she’ll be visiting at the home of someone who doesn’t have your commitment to keeping guns locked up and out of sight. Me, I’m a suspenders-and-a-belt type person. I believe that any plan that relies entirely upon human beings (of any age!) to be perfect is a flawed plan. So around here we lock up the guns and we teach the kids what to do if they find one. That way, we aren’t relying on the kids to be perfect and never disobey. We also aren’t relying on the adults to be perfect and never goof by leaving the safe door open. Here’s how we gun proofed our kids. We began when they were barely old enough to talk and were able to more-orless chant back to us stuff that we said to them. Teaching the Basic Rules The simplest way to start your child’s firearm safety education is to begin by teaching her the Eddie Eagle rules (http://www.nrahq.org/safety/eddie/). These are simple, simple safety rules that even a very young child can understand.

The

Eddie Eagle Rules • Stop!

• Don’t touch!

• Leave the area! 48

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• Tell an adult!

Being a kid, she’ll soon be able to chant those rules along with you, and then back to you without prompting, in no time flat. Don’t stop there, though. That’s just the beginning. The next step is to talk about what the rules mean. For instance, who’s a grownup? If your child has a teenaged babysitter, she needs to know that the teenager is a grownup that she can tell. What if she doesn’t know for sure whether it’s a real gun or a toy? Explain that if she’s even a little bit not sure, treat it like it’s a real gun -- stop, don’t touch, leave the area, tell an adult. Once she’s got a basic idea of what the rules are and what they mean, then you can ask your child this very important question: “Do you know what to do if you really, really, really want to touch the gun?” She may or may not be able to tell you, so you tell her the rules again. Tell her that no matter what she must not touch the gun. But the next step is the critical one. You’re going to disarm her curiosity so that, if she ever does come across a gun when you aren’t around, she won’t be so curious and desperate to touch it that all of your good teaching goes right out the window. So you need to teach her one more, very important, rule: “If I really, really, really want to touch the gun, I will leave the area and ask an adult if I can!” In order to get her to the point where there’s a betterthan-even chance she’ll obey those rules when you aren’t looking, you want to demystify guns. You do not need to go to the range for this. All you need is an unloaded gun, a

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completely safe backstop, a time with no interruptions, and a super-calm demeanor. You are going to teach your child that any time she wants to hold a gun, you will drop whatever else you are doing and stand over her while she holds the unloaded gun pointed in a safe direction. You are doing this so that her curiosity doesn’t kill her sometime when you are not around, and you are doing it so that “leave the room and tell an adult” will never mean the end of fun to her. You are doing that so that “tell an adult” is to her a promise that the adult will satisfy her curiosity and let other good things happen too. IMPORTANT POINT If your child ever does come and tell you about a firearm that she could have touched and didn’t, give her a candy bar or take her to the playground or do whatever it is that you would do to show her that you are really, really

pleased with her. Do not react with panic (except perhaps in private when your child is elsewhere). Instead, react with pride and let her see how pleased and proud you are because she did the right thing. Make telling an adult a pleasant experience!

Ideally, use a handgun because handguns are the most tempting and most likely to be picked up by a child when spotted. Double and then triple-check to be sure it is empty, and put the ammunition in another room behind a locked door.

Disarming Her Curiosity

Be a good example.

Once the rules have been mastered, the next step is to disarm her curiosity. But how to do that? Here are the basic steps.

Let your child see you check again to be sure the gun is empty. Let her watch you make sure it is empty by locking the gun’s action open, looking at the chamber and magazine well to be sure they are both empty. Then feel the empty mag well and the hole in the chamber to be sure your eyes didn’t fool you. If it’s a revolver, run your finger along the holes in the open cylinder and count them aloud. Tell your child what you are doing and why.

Find a safe backstop. This could be a brick fireplace, the long end of a crowded bookshelf, an old piece of body armor, or a stack of phone books at least 2 feet thick as it faces you. You want something that would stop a bullet if one were fired, and you want to explain to your child exactly what you are doing and why when you set it up. You can even tell her the Four Rules at this point, but don’t belabor them yet -just make sure she knows that there are important safety rules that even adults must follow. Make sure there will be no interruptions. Lock the front door, turn the ringer off the phone, and choose a time when there are no other people around. This is going to take your full concentration.

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Empty your firearm.

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She will not absorb all this or even most of it. Tell her anyway. More important, let her see that you never ever ever ever ever point the gun anywhere except the safe direction -- and that you checked three times to make sure it was unloaded -- and that you had her check to see it was unloaded. Be a good example. Explain the ground rules to your child. The ground rules: the gun must stay pointed at the safe backstop at all times. Tell her that the gun has to stay pointed in that direction, and only that direction. Make sure she understands that she must not turn the gun around, nor point it anywhere except the safe direction. You will stay right there with her to help her remember how to be safe. Now comes the scary part: Hand her the gun. Hover. Hover and be ready to grab if the gun waves anywhere else. Stay right with her. Do not allow your attention to wander even for a split second.

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Don’t let her turn the gun around. Keep your hands right there and ready to control if you need to. Let her poke buttons and try to pull the trigger if she wants. Let her peer into the open chamber. If she wants to do something that could result in a pinched finger or worse, offer to hold the gun safely so that she can do whatever it is (poke a finger into the chamber, perhaps).

will let you handle my gun any time you ask, as long as you ask. So do you know what to do if you find a gun you really, really, really want to touch? Don’t touch it! Come tell me, and I will help you touch it safely. Any time you want to handle my gun, you tell me and I will help you.” Then chant the rules again, all five of them: * Stop.

Answer her questions.

* Don’t touch!

She might have a lot of silly questions, or none at all. She might ask you the same thing in four different ways. Do your best to explain whatever she wants to know. If she asks you something you cannot explain, tell her you will look it up together later (and do so).

* Leave the area.

* And if you really, really, really want to touch ... leave the area and ASK an adult.

Wait until she is bored.

Follow through.

After about two minutes, she’ll be bored because face it, there’s nothing exciting about safely holding an unloaded weapon pointing at nothing much, even if you’ve never done it before. Wait until she is bored, and says so; you want her to end this exploration.

If your child asks to see your gun two hours later, drop everything and do all of the above again.

Don’t cut the time short yourself, because “bored” is exactly the feeling you want her to get from this. When she is done exploring the gun, take it back from her and let her see you check again that it is empty as you put it away. Lock it up.

* Tell an adult.

Expect her to ask every couple hours for a couple days, every day or so for a week, and every once in awhile for a long time. As much as possible, as soon as she asks, immediately drop whatever else you are doing and show her your gun again. By helping her to explore safely, you are reinforcing the idea that picking up a gun is not exciting, mysterious, attractive, and forbidden -- it is only mundane and a bit boring and there are safety rules that have to be followed at all times.

Explain to your child that she may handle your gun anytime she wants to as long as she asks, but that she must not ever, ever, ever handle a gun without asking. Ask her what she should do if she ever sees a gun that is out. Chant the rules with her again: * Stop. * Don’t touch! * Leave the area. * Tell an adult. Make a promise. Now it is time to make an important promise, the one that makes all the rest of this work. Here is the promise: “I 50

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Instead of enhancing public safety, he suggests that Canadian gun laws may even have caused an increase in armed robbery. The expansion of the state’s search and seizure powers should be taken very seriously by all civil libertarians concerned about the erosion of Canadians’ individual rights, Mauser warns.

Community Living Day, where developmentallychallenged children and their families take part in fishing in the hatchery pond and then enjoy a fish fry dinner with all the trimmings.

Firearms registration also violates the basic rules of policing set forth in the 1820s by Sir Robert Peel, the founder of the first professional police force, the British Bobbies. In order for laws to be enforced effectively, the police must have the support of citizens being policed, he said. Firearms registration may be seen as an attempt by urbanites to impose their cultural values upon the rest of society. The demonization of average people who happen to own a gun lays the foundation for a massive increase in governmental intrusiveness in the lives of ordinary citizens. “Firearms registration and owner licensing threatens longstanding Canadian liberties and freedoms. The type of gun control Canada has enacted is not consistent with many democratic principles and the protection of civil liberties.” Yet Canada spearheaded a move in the United Nations to impose a similar regime of Draconian restrictions around the world. No law, no matter how restrictive, can protect us from people who decide to commit violent crimes. “There have always been criminals, and there have always been deranged people. Murder has been illegal for thousands of years: We need only remember the saga of Cain and Abel. “The truth is we live in a dangerous world and the government cannot protect us. We must ultimately rely upon ourselves and it is only right we have the necessary tools to do so,” Mauser concluded.

Joel Tost, retired conservation office for the province of Ontario, said “During my 36 years as a Conservation Office in Ontario, I have had the pleasure of working closely with many great outdoor clubs. I consider the Bruce Peninsula Sportsmen as the premier club in Ontario. They are a dedicated group of men and women who give back to the resource and promote education and ethics to our youth and the public. They are leaders in this province in stream rehabilitation and the successful rearing of rainbow trout. This club communicates and shares information and technology with other clubs and has also become the leader in trying to achieve a fair agreement between Ontario the First Nations people in this area. I am very proud to have become a Life Member and look forward to sharing my expertise with them for the sake of improving conservations in Ontario.” In the BPSA programs, as in all their conservation efforts, all guns, ammunition, refreshments, and, even more importantly, the time of the organizers and rangemasters, has been cheerfully donated. Countless volunteer hours are given generously, as members understand the importance in promoting the values of the group. And it’s beginning to pay off, as the next generation of conservationists learn to safely enjoy the pleasures of hunting and responsible shooting. For more information about us check out http://www.bpsportsmen.com/.

Well, I say, if God made women, who needs government’s permission to possess the tool Colonel Colt invented to equalize us? After all, government claims it is trying to make society a safer place for the women and the children. And people have a duty from On High to defend themselves and their families. Self-defence is an instinct, a God-given, not government-given right. For effective gun control, remember to use both hands! Jane Gaffin is an author and free-lance writer living in Whitehorse, Yukon, Canada. She can be contacted at janegaffin@canada.com or visited on the web at http:// www.diArmani.com. www.nfa.ca

All in the family: left to right, siblings Rob, Sarah and Jamie Poirier are all smiles as they practice sighting in their first target.

CanadianFirearmsJournal.com

August / September 2008

by John Noakes

This hunting story is not one that boasts about a trophy mule deer but it is a true story that could have happened to just about any average hunter using minimal gear. It shows how important hunting big game animals is to an average hunter and why we should do all we can to preserve our use of firearms for that purpose.

y twin brother and I live in Kamloops and we look forward to the fall mule deer season. One of the benefits of getting a deer, especially a small buck, is that Don and I, as well as our spouses, enjoy dining on venison.

mule deer fashion but two remained in sight. We proceeded to the rose hip slope where we saw three more big does that also made themselves scarce. Don and I decided to split up but remained in contact via FRS radios.

One of our favourite hunting spots is about an hour’s drive from Kamloops. Because we like to walk and scout the area, we have taken three seasons to become familiar with the cut blocks, the slopes, the game trails and the spots where we have seen deer. Last fall we discovered a southfacing slope that supports a healthy population of black bears that feed on the abundant rose hips!

Within ten minutes I saw three more deer at the top of the slope, some 150 yards away. One was a good - sized buck but he mingled with the two other deer before I could get a shot. “Just be patient”, I told myself, even though my heart was beating fast and I wondered if that would be the only buck we would see that day.

This day our hunt started much the same as many others; we parked the truck in the usual spot near the dead end of a small logging road. The weather was clear and some light frost was on the ground. Don readied his Parker Hale .243 while I prepared my Remington SPS in .308 Winchester for the trek uphill toward the rose hip slope. About half way there we saw the first deer (of some 17 deer) we would see that morning. It was a doe and she happened to be part of a small herd of 5 deer that seemed to appear from nowhere. They bounced up the hill in typical

August / September 2008

After 30 minutes, Don called on the radio and reported that he had seen a couple of deer… both does. I told him about the buck and that I was continuing uphill. Near the top of the hill is a small dip before climbing up through a patch of fir trees to look over a small clearing. “Thump, thump, thump”; the familiar sound of mule deer as they “stot” happened less than 50 yards ahead of me. At least two more deer bounded out of the trees and through part of the clearing but they stopped just on the opposite edge inside the tree line. They knew something had startled them but they weren’t sure what I was because the breeze

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2- point mule deer buck harvested on October 27, 2007 near Kamloops, BC .308 Winchester 150 grain Remington CoreLokt*

This photo was taken near the top of the hill that was generously populated with wild roses. Black bears were seen in the area as well as mule deer. It was evident that the bears had been feeding on the plentiful rosehips!

was in my favour. I took cover behind a couple of small trees (to break my outline) and rested my rifle on a finger - sized twig. “Now for the waiting game”, I whispered to myself. The deer were not scared enough to run very far, so I took out my deer call and made a few gentle bleats. Sure enough, the bigger doe took a few steps toward me, flicked her ears and also tried to smell what I was. The smaller doe also walked around and kept looking toward me. At that time, I turned the deer call around and made a few soft grunts, waited, and then made a couple of more.

Some might say this was the high point in our day’s hunting. Sure, it’s nice to get your buck and even nicer to have excellent meat for the freezer. But, if one misses the scenery or doesn’t smell the fall air and the damp leaves or can’t appreciate the overall experience of being this close to nature on a hunt, then it becomes little more than another pastime on the weekend.

I thought I saw a movement of grey further to the right and downhill in the trees. Yes, it was another deer and it acted differently. I thought I saw small antlers. Yes, it was a buck… but it went behind some trees before I could get a shot. It seemed like the buck would never show itself again but there he was walking from right to left about 75 yards downhill from me. With only a small opening available through the trees, I took the shot and the 150-grain “Corelokt” bullet found its way just behind the left shoulder.

If politicians (who are opposed to the use and ownership of firearms by hunters) could experience a day like this in the woods and also enjoy the fruit of their labour, responsible gun owners in Canada would have fewer concerns than we do now about losing our hunting heritage.

www.nfa.ca

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August / September 2008

by Dave Chappelle

Toronto Mayor Wants Guns Banned Mayor Miller has a solution to Toronto’s criminal gang violence – take guns away from those who abide the law.

What follows is Mayor Miller’s (or Cottontop the Half-Wit if you prefer) position taken from published sources.

When the Editor of Canadian Firearms Journal asked me to write about Toronto Mayor David Miller’s [referred to by me as “Cottontop the Halfwit” (CtHW)] position on banning handguns, I was eager to begin. Then I started researching Miller’s so-called position.

A report by City of Toronto staff was presented to the Mayor’s executive committee. It recommends council pass a zoning bylaw to restrict the use of firearms anywhere in the city, including at firing ranges and gun clubs.

I have low blood pressure. As ailments go, it’s a better one to have than it’s opposite. Instead of the dangerous effects of high blood pressure and consuming potentially dangerous medication, I simply have to keep my extremities moving. Well, reading the mayor’s positions adversely affected my blood pressure – multiple times. So many times was I forced to “put the mouse and keyboard down, and back away slowly” that I’m now checking my blood pressure regularly. At first contact, Stuart Green -- Miller’s gatekeeper -offered me a 15-minute in-person or telephone interview. Turns out that was merely a distraction, however. Having been told to “standby”, I waited, and waited… until finally life intervened and I had to leave. When I explained I could wait no longer that day, I received this response: > Sorry. I didn’t mean today. > Next couple of weeks Seems Miller’s gatekeeper’s definition of “Stand By” is very different from the one I learned when studying for my radiotelephone license. After waiting three weeks I realized “Mister Mayor” wasn’t going to talk to the unwashed recreational firearms community. Instead of honestly answering the difficult questions about his position, Miller instead chose to spread lies and misinformation. I’d like to think Toronto voters will see through his nonsense, but I’m doubtful. Fortunately the rest of the shooting world does, and the boycott of Toronto (torontothebad.com) will expand. 54

August / September 2008

The report also calls for an end to all recreational shooting on city property; closing down shooting ranges in Scarborough and at Union Station. The military and police would be exempt, but the measure bans new firing ranges, gun stores, and manufacturers. According to the mayor, guns – not people – are responsible for killing. “Guns don’t protect people. They make it worse, and we don’t want to get to that type of violent society like they have in the Unites States where the murder rate is ten times ours because people have that philosophy. Given his opinion, it’s understandable that he wants to take your guns away. “Handguns exist for one purpose: they’re designed to kill people. That’s what handguns are for. It’s time that together as Torontonians and Canadians we put an end to the ownership of handguns in our society.” The ban strategy has failed everywhere it’s been tried (including Washington DC, the United Kingdom, Australia, Jamaica, and Mexico). Yet Cotton Top insists -- against all evidence – his ban will work in Toronto. More so, he denies that bans haven’t worked. “If you look at countries that have very strict gun control laws … in England there are significantly lower rates of gun crime and murder. Canada’s [numbers] are about six times England’s and America’s are about 11 times England.” “It’s very clear — the fewer guns available in society the safer you are. I think we’re making a very strong statement symbolically, but we’re also doing an action that will make a very real difference.” He refuses to acknowledge the UK gun crime increase… even when presented with hard evidence.

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Questions for

Mayor Miller

If he’d talk to the recreational firearms community, here are the questions we’d like answered: Carrying a gun anywhere is banned; shooting a gun outside of an approved facility is banned; and murder is banned. Criminals ignore all of those bans. Why do you expect criminals will suddenly abide your handgun ban? What is your response to those who say you have no solution for the Jamaican/African gang problem… that you’re attacking the recreational firearms community because it is an easy target?

Miller’s claim is easily debunked when reading Home Office press releases, or any of the online UK news publications. In an on-air back-and-forth jockeying with a Toronto radio host --“Yes it has”-- “No it hasn’t” -- Miller claimed that gun crime has decreased in the UK since that ban was enacted in 1996, despite Home Office statistics to the contrary. Why close Toronto gun clubs? “Union Station is the biggest transportation hub in Canada. You’re not allowed to take a large tube of toothpaste onto a plane at Pearson [airport]. How on earth in that kind of climate could we allow gun owners to be walking around a place where 80,000 people come through the doors each day? That is, from any perspective, unacceptable.” Miller ignores the obvious – for 81 years target shooters have been safely transporting their target pistols in and out of Union Station. Now that criminals are brazenly shooting in downtown Toronto, safe target shooters must be punished. Q. Why is the mayor so against gun owners? A1. One idiot. Out of millions of safe gun owners… one idiot. A newly licensed target shooter allegedly brought his gun to a strip bar. After being kicked out, he allegedly shot a passerby. That passerby, according to published reports, was a supporter of – if not directly known by – the mayor. Now he seeks revenge against an inanimate object and the law-abiding citizens who posses them. “After John O’Keefe’s tragic killing, I don’t think there’s any defense for sports shooters any more. It’s a hobby that creates danger to others. Guns are stolen routinely from so-called legal owners. It’s time that we got those guns out of Toronto.

In the Republic of Ireland and Jamaica, violent crime -- particularly murder -- became much worse after gun bans. The UK Home Office has admitted that since banning handguns, handgun crime has “trebled” as the Brits say. Why do you want Canadians to suffer the same fate at the hands of criminals? According to the Home Office, home invasions increased drastically after the ban, because criminals realized homeowners were defenseless. Why do you want the same for Torontonians? You claim one-third of crimes in Toronto, including the January 12 shooting death of innocent bystander John O’Keefe on Yonge Street, are committed with legally registered handguns. That figure is significantly lower than your and other’s previous claims. Where did you get it? Does that figure include stolen legally registered handguns? Few perpetrators are captured. How accurate can your figures be? There have been numerous stabbings in Toronto lately. Why are you silent on knife crime? Your petition received only 45,000 signatures of support out of approximately 2.5 million Torontonians. Do you consider such a tiny number of supporters a success? Will Parliament even accept your petition without original signatures?

Continued on page 59 www.nfa.ca

CanadianFirearmsJournal.com

August / September 2008

By Ian Jefferson

Mr. Miller & Councillors, I’m writing in regard to the Toronto City Council proposed ban on handguns. There are four sections to this note. The first is an introduction of who I am so you can understand my perspective. The remaining three sections I hope to address are around violence in Canada, the question and value of individual rights and freedoms, and finally questions of diversity and the nature of prejudice.

I’m just a guy, however life has presented me with some remarkable experiences that I will outline. I’m married and have two teenage kids that are heading to college shortly. I grew up in Ottawa and my family and I lived in the National Capital Region, Aylmer, Vanier then Kemptville until the mid-90’s. At that time I had the opportunity to join a global company in the U.S. and as a result have we have lived in three different US States (New York, North Carolina, and Kentucky) and have spent the last three years living in rural Japan. In addition I’ve had the opportunity to work extensively in additional two countries, Taiwan and Korea. Including travel I’ve been exposed to cultures from about 20 different countries. In recent years we began planning for our return to Canada. Our intention is to retire in the country near Brockville, ON. I have not had a firearm in my home for the last 25 years or so, however I grew up around them. My father was a hunter and taught me the basics of firearms safety. I had a pellet August / September 2008

Since I intend to retire in Canada I hope to resume one of the hobbies of my youth which is the recreational use of firearms. Violence in Canada

Introduction

gun as a kid and later a .22 and spent many a happy hour in my youth plinking away in the basement or at the family cottage. In addition my family has a couple of handguns that are family heirlooms. One was passed on my fathers side and dates back to the early 1900’s. The other from my mother’s side that belonged to her father from before the second world war.

First, there is not a significant general problem with violence in Canada. The level of violent crime in Canada has always been relatively low by international standards. Recently I’ve read that the homicide rate has dropped to 30 year historic lows of 1.6 / 100,000 people. This compares favourably with the lower international rates of industrialized countries. I believe that the Canadian demeanour towards compromise rather than conflict is the determining factor here. There may be a problem with violent crime in Toronto however. When I read the current affairs articles that are available to us in Japan I get the distinct impression that Toronto has managed to create an inner city ethnic ghetto. What gelled this impression for me was the revealing article by Dan Hill in the February 13th Edition of Macleans Magazine. Gratefully this is available on line. I’d like to quote the opening lines of that article: “Over the last year and a half, three young adults who have set foot in my house, in the well-to-do, tree-lined Beaches neighbourhood of Toronto, have been murdered. All black, all by gunshot, all in Toronto.”

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So I’m left with the impression that there is a problem in Toronto that is much the same issue that can be found in many U.S. Cities. Crime and violence isolated to the disenfranchised black minorities in the inner city. It may be surprising to hear that in the U.S. if you remove the inner city ethnic crime rate that the rest of the nation falls into the same kind of violent crime rates as other industrial nations. If we solve the problem of ethnic crime in Toronto, what would the resulting crime rates be? Lest I be misunderstood, I’m not laying the blame for violence on the black community. That responsibility falls squarely on the white European culture that has dominated North America, promoted black slavery and nearly destroyed all Native American cultures. The result has not been positive and we live with the results.

Canada, Japan, China, Taiwan and Myanmar. Only when the minority is considered can you truly see the difference. Minority political opinions, minority religions, minority ethic groups, all are often suppressed, sometimes brutally and in some cases to the point of genocide. Canada itself is guilty of just such acts against it’s own native people. Consider the “Gradual Civilization Act” of 1857 and the fact that the last residential school closed down only in 1990. This is exactly the same kind of oppression

Diversity and Prejudice As a lay person I’ve made a study of diversity and prejudice over the last decade or so I have been out of Canada. I’ve been given the opportunity to be a visible minority by living and working in Asia for five years, and I’ve also participated in workshops discussing diversity from an American context before that. In addition I’ve had the opportunity to see the impact of prejudice in small American cities and formation of a disenfranchised poor black sub culture trapped in the inner city.

Individual Rights and Freedoms My father served in the 2nd world war. He lost his left leg below the knee and of course in the process nearly lost his life.

There is no truly free place in the world, at least none that I have been to. Each nation and culture has it’s own set of limitations on what can be legally and culturally accepted. In my life’s travels, it’s come as a revelation that the difference between “free” countries like the U.S. and Canada and a tyranny is mainly the tolerance and acceptance of minorities and their activities. Besides obvious wealth, in the matter of day to day life there is little difference between www.nfa.ca

http://sandbox.ca/~ijeff/Politics/Guns/ TorontoLetter/GlobalSuicide.pdf I submit that any restriction of freedom legal or otherwise has a negative impact on “living” It costs lives.

I am saying that trying to destroy the Recreational Firearms Community (RFC) culture is not a positive act and it’s not the solution to the problem at hand in Toronto or in Canada.

Growing up this missing limb was a constant reminder of a sacrifice made by him, for me, so that I could enjoy a little more freedom that otherwise might have been possible.

democracy, member of the G7, with the 2nd or 3rd largest economy in the world, is none the less one of the least free places I have ever seen in the world. For firearms for instance it can take 11 years to obtain a legal license for a rifle. It also ranks very high in it’s per capita suicide rate. Per capita 28 times the number of people commit suicide in Japan as are murdered in Canada at twice the Canadian suicide rate. I’ve included the whole table for you so you have the complete context for many countries.

that has been occurring in Canada over the last few decades against the RFC. Your call for a ban on handguns is an attempt to limit a freedom. The limitation of any freedom or the elimination of any reasonable minority activity will have an negative impact on society. I’d like to draw your attention to the impact of restricted freedom. Attached is the global suicide rate for many countries in the world published by the WHO. Suicide might be considered the final attempt at escape for a person with no practical alternatives in life. You may not be aware that Japan, a

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I believe one of the significant contributors to prejudice is fear, and fear is driven by ignorance, so called fear of the unknown. In the case of a minority suffering prejudice from the majority, the minority is as much responsible for reaching out to the majority as vice versa. I wonder if any of the Toronto city council has gone down to the local range or club to see what it is we do. This is why I am writing. I believe there is fear of the RFC in Canada and that fear promotes unwarranted prejudice against us. Your fact sheet that’s available on the Toronto.ca web site is full of alarmist statistics. These are statistics that are August / September 2008

taken out of context, then used to compel an emotional response from the public but in themselves have little or no meaning. I feel these are technically true but morally a lie. I submit that the city government of Toronto is engaging in a campaign of intolerance and prejudice against the RFC. If I were to publish similar statistics against a visible minority, or religious group in Canada I would likely be charged with hate crimes. The so called fact sheet paints a picture of the RFC posing some danger to Canadian society. It calls for the elimination of part of the RFC that can perform it’s recreation in a metropolitan area. To illustrate this point, and given my limited resources I’ll pick one the of the “facts” from the Toronto.ca web site. “the 3rd leading cause of death for 15-24 year olds”. http://sandbox.ca/~ijeff/Politics/Guns/TorontoLetter/Toronto5_ html_m76bcb079.gif Raw data http://sandbox.ca/~ijeff/Politics/Guns/TorontoLetter/ Mortality15-19_t019_en.pdf What’s Killing Canadians I’ve also included with this document the original source of this information and I used the Statistics Canada groups whenever possible. I hope you can see how out of context statistics are being used in the Firearms fact sheet to paint an inaccurate picture. I believe you will find that each of these “facts” if analysed will yield similar mis-representation of the situation.

Each one of us is... An ambassador, a teacher, and a mentor. One of the most important functions of the National Firearms Association is making firearms ownership and use relevant to growing numbers of Canadians. To prosper, we must have a steady flow of new shooters and enthusiasts entering our proud firearms heritage. Your membership and your donations to the National Firearms Association are helping us develop the programs Canada needs to make sure our firearms heritage continues to grow.

I want to help Make It Happen! Here is my contribution to the

National Firearms Association to help protect my rights to own and use firearms. T $100 T $50 T $25 T $________ T My Cheque or Money Order enclosed T Charge my Visa/MasterCard/AMEX Card #:______________________________________ Expiry: ____________ Signature: ______________________________________________________

Name: _________________________________________________________ Address: _______________________________________________________ City/Town: ________________ Prov:_________ Postal Code: ____________ Ph.:__________________________ Fx.: ______________________________ E-mail: ________________________________________________________ Mail this form to: National Firearms Association, Box 52183, Edmonton, Alberta T6G 2T5

August / September 2008

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Continued from page 55

“Guns are so unsafe that we, as a city, are not going to treat it [target shooting] as a hobby anymore. We’re going to treat it as the serious safety hazard that it is.”

it’s between 30 and perhaps up to 40 per cent Canadian sourced. Regardless, there’s a significant proportion of identifiable guns that come from Canada. That’s clear.”

A2. He’s afraid to take the necessary action on gun crime. That would require increased police presence in areas where most crimes occur – areas predominately inhabited by Jamaican and African immigrants. Doing so might get him labeled racist.

But RCMP and OPP put the number closer to 10 per cent. According to the Toronto Police Services board the actual number registered is between 3%-5%. And there is no definition of a “crime gun”.

This brings up an important point -- Miller only talks about getting GUNS off the streets… he never once mentions getting the PEOPLE using them illegally of the streets. As few urban voters grasp the popularity of recreational shooting, Mayor Miller chooses to scapegoat law-abiding shooters instead, and he has no problem inventing statistics to “back” his claims.

Insisting that many guns used in crimes “are stolen from so-called legal owners” indicates what Miller thinks of law-abiding Canadian firearm owners. “It’s very clear — the fewer guns available in society the safer you are. I think we’re making a very strong statement symbolically, but we’re also doing an action that will make a very real difference. “A few years ago I was told informally by the then police chief that it was high as 50 per cent were Canadian sourced. I say now, over the last couple of years www.nfa.ca

To anyone with knowledge or even a bit of common sense, Cotton Top the Half Wit’s claims are laughable. But evil lurks behind his moronic ramblings. “A legal gun owner just last week [had 125 guns seized from] a basement apartment in the Beaches area of Toronto. That’s unacceptable. That kind of risk happens all too frequently. Imagine if the tipoff had gone to a gang instead of police? That would be a huge arsenal on the streets of Toronto. [Under] Canadian laws today, literally there is no limit on the number of guns somebody can own, if they’ve got a permit.” A Toronto collector was raided in the middle of the night. His address was published, and police stole his entire collection. Yet he was only charged with ONE count of unsafe storage – a very shaky claim, as unsafe storage is difficult to prove when the registered owner is in the residence.

His statistics, like the wind, are always changing. He began at 50%, dropped it to 40, and now it hovers between 30-40%. How he arrives at his figures is anybody’s guess. “The facts are very clear, no matter what the gun lobby says – and they are extremely well-organized in this country and fight very aggressively,” Miller said. “But between 30 and 40 per cent of the handguns used in crimes in Toronto come from local owners. “They’re stolen from them. That’s a huge public safety issue.’’

“I hear about a lot of shootings in Toronto, but I haven’t heard of any using target pistols,” said OPP Insp. Tony Cooper, deputy chief firearms officer with the weapons enforcement center.

But that didn’t stop Miller from convicting this poor gun owner in the press because he seems impervious to facts. How many were actually used in the commission of a crime, rather than merely being “possessed” by an individual not legally authorized to have one, or were merely present at the location when police arrived? How many listed as “locally sourced” were stolen from or lost by police, military, and armored car guards? Regardless of what the real figure is, the vast majority of firearms are smuggled across the border. Stopping shooters from visiting ranges does nothing to prevent thugs from using firearms while committing crimes.

CanadianFirearmsJournal.com

The US Supreme Court ruling that states handguns are specifically allowed for self-defense must send Mayor Miller into a tizzy. How “American”. Timing is indeed everything. With the US Supreme Court affirming what we’ve known all along, that selfdefense is every person’s right, will Canada take a logical step forward, or cower in the darkness pretending they can’t hear the cry of Freedom just south of them? Watch out, gun owners. Especially if you live in Toronto. Miller refuses to face reality, no matter how hard it slaps him in the face. August / September 2008

by Bob Shell

Preparing Your

Game

for the

Taxidermist

ou just shot the trophy of a lifetime. All the backslapping and congratulations are over and the pictures have been shot. Now what do you do? Of course you want to mount the head on the wall to show everyone your magnificent trophy. But you are in a quandary because you don’t know how to go about getting the head to the taxidermist. Since this is an unguided hunt the only other person there is your buddy and he is as clueless as you are. You know that some steps have to be taken but you don’t know what they are. Will you lose this trophy because you didn’t care for it? You plan all other aspects of your hunt such as sighting in your guns and proper clothing so why not care of the meat and trophy. It’s kind of foolish to go to all the trouble of doing a hunt and losing the head to spoilage.

rug made will have a lot to do with the quality of the mount. A taxidermist can perform some pretty good cosmetic work on a botched animal but there are limits to what he can do. You can Google taxidermy and get many sites dealing with the subject. Two examples are www.learntaxidermy.com and www.taxidermy. net. There are lists of shops that provide taxidermy services from fish mounts to all types of game. If there is no local supplier of taxidermy services then you can shop online and get someone who can help you. Before you go on your hunt it’s a good idea to line up a taxidermist beforehand. As a rule most gun shops can refer you to someone in the area. You can visit with him and get an idea as to how to prepare your mount in the field. He can give you some do’s and don’ts to prepare your trophy.

taxidermy is an art and good work isn’t cheap. There are various ways to mount a head and you can discuss the options with him. Frequently he will have mounts or pictures in his shop that you can look at and determine what’s best for you. If you are on a guided hunt make sure you have a clear understanding on who is going to do what in regards to the animal. Does the outfitter have refrigeration capabilities for the game? That is an important consideration especially it it’s warm during the hunt. If the head or hide is allowed to get too warm over a period of time it may ruin the trophy. Proper salting of a hide is another option that you might want to check out. In warm weather it may save the hide for you. If it gets warm for an extended period of time the hair will fall out making it very difficult or impossible for a taxidermist to do a good job preparing it for your wall. That’s where the knowledge of salting and fleshing the hide may come in handy. Some outfitters may charge a nominal fee

The thing that you should have done before you went on the hunt is to learn some of the basics of taking care of your game. How you take care of the head or hide if you are going to have a

Like every aspect of a hunting trip proper preparation can make your hunt a memorable experience. You can also check prices but keep in mind that

August / September 2008

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for butchering and trophy care services and it’s usually worth it to have them do it unless it’s something you are good at and like to do. You need to be prepared to be able to hang the animal from a tree or other support in order to successfully do anything with it. If you anticipate getting a really large animal then a chain hoist or come along may not be out of order. Besides good knives and a sharpener you need a saw for cutting through the bone and some rope or straps to hoist the animal up a sturdy tree branch. You might need something to load him on the back of the truck in case you can’t lift him. An animal is dead weight and is very difficult to hoist. Recently for instance I saw where two strong men couldn’t lift a 350 lb boar on the back of a pickup truck. Another possibility to get your animal out is a pull behind trailer such as an Aluma-Fold (www.alumafold.com) which is a clever way to get something out. If you shoot a really large animal and you are going to keep the meat as well as the head you must be prepared to quarter it which requires saws and bags to keep everything dirt free. A large elk or moose head is a load upon itself and requires some planning to get it out especially in rough terrain. You should always prepare for the worst case scenario when bringing out your animal. It may fall in a gully and you have to get it out which can be a back breaking task. Imagine toting an elk or moose up a steep hill. Such a task may take a full day or so depending on the equipment, help available and circumstances. You want to take care of the animal as soon as possible especially in warm weather. Usually you hang them upside down with a game skinner (www.deerskinner.com) to help you out through their back legs at their hamstrings. Good strong wire can be used if necessary. You need a good sharp knife or knives of the proper design for skinning because while you want to remove as much flesh as possible you don’t want to cut through the skin. When you cape them you normally cut around their body a few inches in back of their front legs. That gives you some extra hide in case the taxidermist has to make a repair. Using hide and hair from that same animal makes it easier to match the colors if the need arises. Then cut a few inches down on the legs all around and then use a slit and carefully remove the skin. Then skin down to the base of the neck and go another inch or two to keep from cutting the skin with the saw. Cut the meat then saw as close to the shoulder as possible. Remember you want to give the taxidermist as much material as possible to work with. After removing the head get it in ice as soon as possible to preserve that fine trophy. I would hose it off first if water is available. Doing a few steps correctly can make it possible to have a trophy that you can enjoy for many years.

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CanadianFirearmsJournal.com

August / September 2008

by Vin Suprynowicz

A brand new idea! One R. Lane wrote in on March 31: “After reading his March 23 diatribe, it is clear to me that Review-Journal columnist Vin Suprynowicz has not yet learned the obvious: the more handguns a country has in circulation, the more handgun deaths that country is going to get — not less. “The United States has some 200 million handguns in circulation, and the highest handgun death rate (per 100,000 population) of any industrialized nation, with the possible exception of Brazil. Japan has the fewest number of handguns in circulation and the lowest handgun death rate per 100,000. “If all these guns make us safer, we should be the safest nation on earth.” Thus endeth R. Lane’s succinct submission. Wow. This really simplifies the question, doesn’t it? All we have to do is look to see if we can find any historic examples where a government has banned access to handguns for a sizeable portion of the population, and see what that did to handgun death rates among that population. And you know what? It turns out R. Lane is correct! Back in the 1920s and 1930s, the forward-thinking German “Weimar” republic effectively banned firearms possession by just about anyone but the military, the government police, and 62

August / September 2008

the ruling “Junker” class, who were allowed to keep their fancy hunting rifles. The ban was particularly effective among the ethnic minorities, such as the Jews. Was this effective in keeping the Jews from killing each other with handguns? Yes! Later, when millions of Jews — essentially all the Jews in Germany and the German-occupied portions of Europe — were rounded up and sent to concentration camps including Auschwitz and Buchenwald to be exterminated, despite the fact that on some mornings the other prisoners were each given water and a piece of bread, while the Jewish prisoners were not allowed to either eat or drink — did the Jews kill anyone with a handgun in order to get some food or water to keep themselves or their loved ones from starving. No! They couldn’t, because they HAD no handguns! See how well that works? Now, some troublemakers may point out they pretty much all died early and violent deaths anyway, so the MANNER in which they died- the fact that they died of starvation, or by being gassed in the extermination chambers, or being shot with rifle bullets — isn’t really as important as the fact that they might have defended themselves and avoided being loaded on the trains

to the death camps if they’d HAD handguns. But that’s hardly the point at issue, is it? Besides, what are you saying: That they should have disobeyed the lawful orders of the duly constituted authorities? The government took away their handguns, and — just as R. Lane predicted we’d find — their rate of handgun deaths dropped to almost nothing. Or did it? At www.jpfo.org/filegen-n-z/ survive.htm, Aaron Zelman, head of the civil rights organization Jews for the Preservation of Firearms Ownership, interviews Holocaust survivor Theodore Haas, who, as it turns out, managed to get himself shot with a handgun while at Dachau — more than once — DESPITE the ban. “Q.) You mentioned you were shot and stabbed several times. Were these experiments, punishment or torture? “A.) They were punishment. I very often, in a fit of temper, acted while the brain was not in gear. The sorry results were two 9 mm bullets in my knees. Fortunately, one of the prisoners had a fingernail file and was able to dig the slugs out.” But this, as R. Lane would doubtless point out, is “the exception that proves the rule.” In contrast, look at the trouble that was caused when a few surviving Jews in the Warsaw ghetto were

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allowed to lay hands on a few handguns on April 19, 1943 (a date which our own Janet Reno decided to commemorate 50 years later by gassing and incinerating a bunch of our own innocent women and babies in a church at Waco, Texas, for daring to possess perfectly legal firearms.) Those Polish Jews used those handguns to kill Nazisympathizing Ukrainian guards and take away their rifles. Then, with this slight increase in armament, they were able to hold German Wehrmacht forces at bay for weeks, tying up units that were badly needed by Hitler on the Russian front. Surely we can all agree that was a bad thing. How much better it would have been had those desperate Jews had not been able to get their hands on even a few handguns. Why, maybe then they would have marched peacefully onto the trains to the death camps, sparing everyone a whole lot of trouble, and not setting the kind of dangerous example that would encourage surviving Jews to go and successfully defend themselves against overwhelmingly more numerous Arab aggressors in fledgling Israel five years later. Here in America — where gun control has always been aimed at disarming women and blacks while letting good ole white boys keep their huntin’ guns– we know all about “uppity” minorities who won’t “keep their place,” don’t we, R. Lane? (See “Bitches With Guns” at www.aware.org/success/bwg.shtml or www. gunowners.org/wv20.htm .) We return to my friend Aaron Zelman’s interview with concentration camp survivor Theodore Haas: “Q.) Did the camp inmates ever bring up the topic, ‘If only we were armed before, we would not be here now’? “A.) Many, many times. Before Adolf Hitler came to power, there was a black market in firearms, but the German people had been so conditioned to be law abiding, that they would never consider buying an unregistered gun. The German people really believed that only hoodlums own such guns. What fools we were. “It truly frightens me to see how the government, media, and some police groups in America are pushing for the same mindset. In my opinion, the people of America had better start asking and demanding answers to some hard questions about firearms ownership, especially if the government does www.nfa.ca

not trust me to own firearms, why or how can the people be expected to trust the government? “There is no doubt in my mind that millions of lives could have been saved if the people were not ‘brainwashed’ about gun ownership and had been well armed. Hitler’s thugs and goons were not very brave when confronted by a gun. Gun haters always want to forget the Warsaw Ghetto uprising, which is a perfect example of how a ragtag, half starved group of Jews took up 10 handguns and made asses out of the Nazis.” Thus ends the interview with Theodore Haas. Other population groups who saw their rates of death by handgun bullets reduced after handgun bans included the prosperous Ukrainian farmers under Stalin in the 1930s, and just about everyone under Mao Tse-Tung in China after 1949 and under Pol Pot in Cambodia a few decades later. See these fine “progressive” leaders’ proud death tolls at the “Gun Control Hall of Fame” at http:// ecclesia.org/truth/fame.html. But not from handguns! So now we have some hard, historical examples of the kind of peaceful paradise that victim disarmament statists like R. Lane have in mind for us. As for whether Japan is a “safer” place to live than America, there’s no accounting for taste, though we might want to examine a few other causes of death that seem to be far higher there, including “committing suicide by jumping out of a high window while under interrogation by police,” before embracing that particular system, whole hog. Personally, I don’t think aiming to be the “safest” nation on earth is shooting very high. I’d much prefer to live in “the freest and safest” nation on earth. And this was indeed the freest and safest nation on earth, R. Lane (possibly tied with equally well-armed Switzerland) — from 1782 to about 1912, back when we were also the best-armed nation on earth. De Tocqueville wrote of his amazement that a single woman could travel the entire length of the Mississippi without fear of harassment in the 1830s; most Americans didn’t even lock their front doors. Since then, crime has indeed crept upward, along with a lot of other infringements on our freedoms, our happiness, and our prosperity. What’s changed since 1913 that might help us explain that? Can any of you “progressives” out there help me, here?

CanadianFirearmsJournal.com

August / September 2008

by Gary K. Kangas, SASS Life Member #223, Regulator & Sybil Kangas, SASS Life Member #55147

Re-enactment is an excellent way to preserve our firearms heritage.

rom Louisburg to Vancouver Island there are opportunities to be involved with Canada’s firearms use and ownership. From the earliest era of European contact to the World Wars and everything in between there are associations and historic sites dedicated to portraying our past and they always encourage more participation.

Gary & Sybil Kangas have produced Wild West shows, videos and stage productions. Their writing has been published in: Trails End Magazine, Guns & Ammo and the Cowboy Chronicle plus various newspapers and journals. They are international competitors in Cowboy Action Shooting, life members of the Single Action Shooting Society (SASS) and long time members of the National Firearms Association.

These associations include civilian and military re-enactment from early colonization, the Seven Years War, the American Revolution, the Fur Trade, Napolianic Wars, settlement of the frontier, Fenian Raids, homesteading, the Rebellion of ’85, Boar War and later into the 20th century. The attraction of re-enactment is,it is not age, gender, or ethnic specific. Real life re-enactments require the young, old, male, and female. Many re-creations of our past include participants from all walks of life. Re-enactment is fun, gratifying and an easy way to enjoy our own collective and individual history. It informs, dramatizes and enlarges the value of those who have passed before us. It also displays some very interesting and tantalizing vignettes of our local story. Get involved. Seek out the groups or sites in your community. It is very rewarding. A short (and by no means complete) list of re -enactment groups is listed below: • Single Action Shooting Society: www.sassnet.com • Manitoba Living History Society: www.manitobalivinghistory.com • His Majesty’s Royal Newfoundland Regiment of Foot: www.signalhilltattoo.ca • Kings Orange Rangers: www.angelfire.com/ns/KingsOrangeRangers/ • Canadian Regiment of Fencible Infantry: www.fencibles.ca

August / September 2008

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By Christopher di Armani

International Defensive Pistol Association IDPA

is, at it’s core, exactly what its name suggests: defensive pistol training. IDPA is the use of stock pistols or revolvers and full-charge ammunition to solve simulated “real-world” self-defense scenarios. Prior to the formation of IDPA, there was no place to compete and hone one’s skill with equipment designed for and suitable for self-defense. Other shooting sports are just that, sports with no relevance to self-defense. Shooters competing in defensive pistol events are required to use practical handguns and holsters that are deemed suitable for self-defense use. “Competition Only” equipment, such is common in IPSC (International Practical Shooting Confederation), is not permitted. The main goal of IDPA is to test the skill and ability of an individual, not his equipment or gamesmanship. The sport came about as a response to the many perceived shortcomings of IPSC competitions. The founders of IDPA (Bill Wilson, John Sayle, Ken Hackathorn, Dick Thomas, Walt Rauch and Larry Vickers), felt IPSC competitions were too far removed from the reality of defensive shooting situations.

to a division-specific maximum of 10 rounds, it is possible to be competitive in IDPA without a huge outlay of cash. If you’re interested in using truly practical pistols to solve challenging and exciting defensive shooting situations, then IDPA is for you. Courses of fire fall into two categories: Self-Defense scenarios or Standard exercises. Self-Defense scenarios are simulations of actual or possible “real world” confrontations. These scenarios typically require shots from 3 - 20 yards and often require the shooter to change firing points and shoot from awkward positions. Standard exercises are designed to test specific shooting and gun handling skills. They do not attempt to simulate a potential threat situation. For more information on IDPA, please visit http://www. idpacanada.com/ or http://www.idpa.com/ and for more information on IPSC, please visit http://www.ipsc-canada. org/.

The use of extensively modified guns, handmade ammunition, and speed-draw holsters impractical for self-defense all led to this belief. IPSC had evolved into “gun races”, where if you had the latest equipment, you could be competitive. Without it, you could not. That being said, there is a great deal of enjoyment to be had in IPSC, as the 1st Place trophy on my wall clearly attests. It simply is no longer real-world training for self-defense. Since alterations to the sidearm are carefully regulated in IDPA, and magazine capacity is limited www.nfa.ca

CanadianFirearmsJournal.com

August / September 2008

By Christopher di Armani

thank you, our members and readers, for staying with us as we move to a more aggressive position in defense of our firearms rights. Toronto Mayor Miller’s ever-increasing “firearms phobias” show how vital it is for us to stand ever vigilant in defense of our rights.

We must therefore look to friends outside our borders to be reminded of exactly how much we have lost, and to help motivate us to regain that lost ground.

We sent the last issue of CFJ to every federal Member of Parliament, every Ontario Member of Provincial Parliament, and the entire Toronto City Council.

While the birth of Canada’s “gun control” scheme was a perfect storm of unethical politics, Wendy Cukier, left to her own devices, would have been just another obscure college teacher. Instead she hooked up with Rebecca Peters and the rest of the “ban civilian guns” crowd at the United Nations.

Do we think we will change the minds of the likes of Miller or McGuinty? Of course not. Hoplophobes (those with an irrational fear of firearms) will never accept all of the sound research that proves they are on the wrong track. However, by letting our politicians know where we stand, those who support us will know we support them as well. By offering them a magazine that clearly shows the folly of “cracking down on law-abiding citizens”, we hope to educate the fence-sitters, those who aren’t sure what path is correct. This issue is also being sent to them, for in this issue we tackle the issue of prohibitions head-on. With the help of some very bright researchers, we show that prohibiting devices or behaviours does not curb societal problems, but actually encourages them. That is research that politicians like Miller or McGuinty simply don’t want to hear. What our elected officials should strive for, however, is to be men and women who, rather than jumping on the latest emotinonal bandwagon, will examine the facts before making public policy decisions.

Is Toronto Mayor Miller’s firearms phobia a home-grown Canadian idea? Hardly.

These individuals and non-governmental organizations hold individual rights and freedoms in contempt. They are accountable for neither their policy nor their actions, yet they work behind the scenes as though they ruled the globe. Why don’t we hear more about these groups and individuals in the daily press? For the same reason you rarely hear about individuals using firearms to protect their lives and their families. Guns and the non-negotiable right of self-defense are merely what we gun owners see threatened. Free Speech is also under attack, as McLeans Magazine, Mark Steyn, Ezra Levant and the Western Standard know all too well. Our right to inform the political process or even to discuss it privately in groups of three or more is threatened worldwide under “conspiracy laws”. Canada’s own “gag law” was affirmed by our own Supreme Court, despite their admitting it violated our constitution.

As gun owners we know how seldom that happens. Canada’s gun laws are the result of these “policy bandwagons”, not sound research.

We have no choice, if our culture is to survive, but to think globally and act locally. We must adopt the strengths of global vision and understanding, and work with our allies internationally to regain freedoms stolen from us and our parochial mind set.

Unfortunately, stupid policy is not restricted to our airspace. The war against human rights has “gone global”, and if our Canadian culture and heritage are to survive, so must we.

For those who are confused, lack vision, or worse, lack the stomach for the fight at hand; for those who have succumbed to the “magic wish” syndrome, I thank you for your support in the past.

This globalization of the anti-rights movement has already cost us dearly. Anti-rights activists have already succeeded in destroying most of Canada’s gun culture.

Please join us on the battlefield of our Rights.

August / September 2008

We have serious work to do, and it is not for the faint of heart.

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