I would consider writing to the editor on this extremely serious, but extremely ridiculous overkill of a common fall happening, which was likely a hunter taking his firearm to his vehicle or back to his/her home. As the article states, what overkill of a common fall sight.

There were guns in virtually every home, and children learned the difference between play and real guns and there were virtually NO accidents or misuse. It was common for children as young as 5 to wear their “Roy Rogers” cap guns and holsters to school or almost everywhere. There was no such thing as the idiotic term “gun crime.” When is the last time YOU saw a gun load itself and go out and cause terror and death? Only the EXTREMELY RARE occasion when some demented lunatic goes to the now common “gun free zones” and commits mass murder, is the common tool of millions of Canadians used as a weapon.

Some 40 years ago one of the first hardware stores in Edmonton, the WW Arcade decided to close, in the days not very far past when every store in every small town sold guns and ammunition in the same manner as groceries.

When the 75-year-old hardware store held its closing out sale, selling most everything you could imagine from carpentry to hunting supplies, the place was packed with shoppers. I estimate that they had close to 1000 new and used guns in the store. Personally, I purchased a beautiful Lee Enfield with brass and the built in cleaning kit in the stock for $10.00. I also bought two cases of shotgun shells and two cases (ten boxes in each) of .303 ammunition and a large bear trap for a souvenir. I hung the rifle on its sling over one shoulder, the bear trap over the other, and staggered down the street to my car three blocks away with my treasures. A beat cop passed me about one block away and asked if he could help. I gladly accepted and he carried my 60 lbs of ammunition to my car. I got his name and phone number and took him duck hunting later that fall. We became lifetime friends.

Today I would be surrounded by SWAT teams, tasered or shot by a sniper and at the very least jailed for many years, or dead, for the same then common act. There were masses of people buying shotguns, rifles, ammunition, carpenter tools, saws, axes, etc. It was a very common sight to see people carrying their treasures down the sidewalk of Jasper Avenue downtown hopping on buses or walking to their vehicles with a rifle or shotgun over their shoulder. No one even looked sideways at them because we lived in a safe society where the terms such as “mass shooting” and “live home invasion” were not yet coined, and the police were our friends and allies.

On the rare occasion when burglaries were carried out, they were done with careful planning and casing targets until no one was home. Today, protected by Canada’s vicious and up-side-down gun laws, daylight home invaders have no fear and commonly kick in doors while people are home, to rape, pillage, assault, rob, and often kill. Normal Canadians have been effectively rendered helpless against armed assault by criminals, while the criminals suffer lesser penalties than a normal person charged with “illegal possession” of their centuries long right to own property.

At least two major schools in Edmonton had rifle ranges in the basement and youths as young as 10 would carry their target rifle and ammunition on the bus for practice and training. When Trudeau began his pogrom against lawful productive gun owners, and his policy of coddling violent criminals On October 7, 1971, Solicitor General Jean Pierre Goyer announced in the House of Commons the Government’s intention to stress rehabilitation of criminals even though it posed a risk to the public. He went on to say that:

“...too many Canadians disregard the fact that the correctional process aims at making the offender a useful and law-abiding citizen, and not any more an individual alienated from society and in conflict with it… Consequently, we have decided from now on to stress the rehabilitation of individuals rather than protection of society.”

What also followed this # backwards pronouncement was the revolving doors for repeat offenders and the deliberate planned denigration and demonizing of honest and law abiding citizens who owned their tools called firearms. None of these firearms were “weapons” unless on the very rare occasion of a home being invaded by thieves intent on stealing or worse, they were sometimes used to warn off criminals or in extreme cases where life and limb were in mortal danger, they were shot. That was called “self defense.” Trudeau, and now our own government, have declared self defense “an illegal act” and virtually every person who defends his life and property is charged and prosecuted as a worse criminal than the attempted murderers. Just ask Ian Thomson who saved his own life and the lives of his dogs with only warning shots. What followed was a horrible travesty of what we used to know as “justice.” The police have become the enemy of law abiding firearms owners, and considering that these very people were the biggest allies and supporters of police, is a tragedy that may never be able to be corrected. Certainly not as long as the vicious and invasive, dangerous and horribly expensive C-68 - the criminals best friend - is still the law of the land.

C-68 MUST be repealed, AS PROMISED before the vast harm it has caused becomes irreparable.

The article below is only one example of the tragic waste of money and law enforcement resources used to attack ONLY the law abiding firearms and property owners. Slave Lake and High River are more disgusting examples of violations of these rights and how the productive and honest are ravaged by a fraudulently passed law that should never have seen the light of day in a so-called free society.

Sincerely,

Don Klein

Gun call causes upset “I think it’s a complete overreaction.” —Orillia Packet