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The problem, of course, as anyone who spends a second or two thinking about it quickly realizes, is that it’s an incredibly stupid plan.

The main argument against a national ban is that it would not interrupt the flow of guns that are actually responsible for the shootings in our major cities. Those would continue to come in, as ever, over our undefended land border with the United States, a country absolutely awash in guns. A national ban would simply inconvenience and anger, at considerable public expense, a bunch of law-abiding Canadians.

The Liberals were right to conclude this. But once you accept that logic — that a national ban would not interrupt the flow of guns entering the country illegally — the gig is up. Local bans will do absolutely nothing that a national ban couldn’t do — they will inherently be less effective. And the national ban won’t work. How will the lesser version of it somehow do better?

Once you accept, as the Liberals have, that a national ban isn’t the answer, you’ve already accepted all the facts that prove that local bans won’t be the answer, either. There is no logical way around this.

Think about it. If we can’t stop handguns from crossing the U.S. border, what are we going to do to stop them from coming into Toronto or Vancouver from the countryside? Are we going to have border patrol checkpoints on every freeway, arterial road and laneway running into our cities? This is the ultimate symbolic gesture. It will accomplish absolutely nothing but inconveniencing people who aren’t the problem.

My own views on this are on record — I oppose, strongly, a handgun ban. But a handgun ban is at least a theoretical answer to a real problem. It’s a wrong but logically coherent position. A partial ban isn’t — it has almost all the downside of the national ban and none of the theoretical upside. This is obviously a political ploy and nothing else. I’m amazed any party would even propose it, especially when the stated goal is literally saving lives.

Yet here we are.

National Post

magurney@postmedia.com

Twitter.com/MattGurney