Christian Conservative Christian "Independent"

I'm an evangelical Christian, member of the CPC, but presently & unjustly exiled to wander the political wilderness.
All opinions expressed here are solely my own.

Wednesday, July 25, 2007

Various items

The Tories have fired back (perhaps a poor choice of words... oh well) at those who are calling for a complete ban on handguns... reminding Canadians that new legistlation calling for tougher sentences is being held up in the unelected Liberal Senate.

On that note, there is a well made point on Crux of the Matter... Canada does not have a gun control problem, we have a "criminal control" problem.

In other news, it seems the Tories have their candidate for Outremont... former diplomat Gilles Duguay. Nice move, politically... run a former diplomat against a Liberal who is being critized for his views on foreign relations, specifically Israel. With a strong NDP candidate in Thomas Mulcair, a former environment minister for the Quebec Liberals, the selection of a fellow professor could seriously blow up in Dion's face. Imagine... how on earth are they going to spin it if they lose BOTH Quebec by-elections, including Outremont that has long been regarded as a Liberal fortress?

It always warms my heart to see headlines like this... "Fundraisers fail to dent Liberal leadership debt". Hey, the more they have to spend on debt, the less they have to preach their lies about us in the next election!

Finally, to all the Warren haters, lay off the guy... yea, he made a bone-headed move with the Hiller photo, but we all make mistakes. (though I will say, it was nice to see his Hiller attack strategy blow up... "Yup, it blowed up REAL good" - Unknown quote)

Labels: , , , , , ,

17 Comments:

  • At Wed Jul 25, 03:19:00 p.m. EDT, Blogger rob said…

    The line about the bill being held up in the Senate isn't very accurate.

    Besides, those bills have nothing to do with lowering gun crime; they are all 'after-the-fact' bills designed to do something after the crime has already been committed.

     
  • At Wed Jul 25, 03:21:00 p.m. EDT, Blogger rob said…

    Oops!

    Here is the link.

     
  • At Wed Jul 25, 03:44:00 p.m. EDT, Blogger Christian Conservative said…

    "they are all 'after-the-fact' bills designed to do something after the crime has already been committed."

    True... with a view towards deterance. As a young person, I remember my highschool classmates stating catagorically that they were willing to break the law because they knew there were little or no consequences for it.

    (of course, that was considering the old YOA, but our adult justice system isn't to far off from that either)

    In this country, many criminals know that they can get away with a whole lot. There is a revolving door in our system, and our current system is not working. If we make our justice system one that people want to avoid at all costs, maybe, just maybe, people will make choices that won't wind them up there.

    Wouldn't you agree that our current system of programs and slap-on-the-wrist sentances simply aren't working?

     
  • At Wed Jul 25, 03:53:00 p.m. EDT, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    Deterrents, in this tougher sentancing, do reduce crime (otherwise, why are there penalties at all?).
    Also, keeping those who are the highest risk to committ crime in jail longer at least gives society more time spent crime free before a convict can potentially reoffend. It does drop the overall numbers and by extension lowers the crime rate. Although its something that takes effect over a longer period of time.

     
  • At Wed Jul 25, 03:58:00 p.m. EDT, Blogger Christian Conservative said…

    As for the bills, various parts of our agenda, not just the crime bills, are deliberatly being held up in the Senate... now why is that?

    Take S-4 for example... any idea where that one stands? ;-)

    From the Senate records:

    The Senate of Canada
    Order Paper and Notice Paper
    -----------------------------------

    Issue 114
    Tuesday, September 18, 2007
    2:00 p.m.

    ORDERS OF THE DAY
    GOVERNMENT BUSINESS

    Bills

    No. 1.
    June 18, 2007 — Resuming debate on the motion of the Honourable Senator Nolin, seconded by the Honourable Senator Oliver, for the second reading of Bill C-23, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (criminal procedure, language of the accused, sentencing and other amendments).

    No. 2.
    June 14, 2007 — Resuming debate on the motion of the Honourable Senator Stratton, seconded by the Honourable Senator Tkachuk, for the second reading of Bill C-10, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (minimum penalties for offences involving firearms) and to make a consequential amendment to another Act.

    No. 3.
    June 5, 2007 — Second reading of Bill C-35, An Act to amend the Criminal Code (reverse onus in bail hearings for firearm-related offences).


    Still being debated.

     
  • At Wed Jul 25, 04:19:00 p.m. EDT, Blogger rob said…

    It's funny, I almost said "please, please don't show your ignorance on the issue by areguing that this bill will have some sort of detterent effect on would-be criminals". But I didn't. And then, you did. Really, it's my fault. ;)

    Criminologists have been showing us for years that there is no evidence that longer sentences lead to fewer offences. I wish it were that easy. I wish we could just be "tougher", and then crime would fall. Unfortunately, that isn't the reality of the situation. So, we have to be smarter about crime.

    As for the Senate issue, did you check out the link that I provided? The amount of time that the bills have been there is not unusual at all, particularly considering that the bill may be unconstitutional as it stands right now. But again, most importantly, those bills do not lower gun crime. They deal with it once it has already happened.

     
  • At Wed Jul 25, 05:18:00 p.m. EDT, Blogger Christian Conservative said…

    Sorry... I'm one of those old-fashioned "law and order" types who believe that letting criminals off the hook just breeds more crime, and that most of the studies that say otherwise is just bunk.

    I wish there was a better solution... oh wait, there is! ;-)

     
  • At Wed Jul 25, 05:27:00 p.m. EDT, Blogger rob said…

    Sorry... I'm one of those old-fashioned "law and order" types who believe that letting criminals off the hook just breeds more crime, and that most of the studies that say otherwise is just bunk.

    This has sort of turned into something similar to the global warming debate - ideology over evidence. It makes it sort of frustrating to debate with you when you're so incurious facts that don't support your ideological positions.

    I don't mean to be hard on you, because you are pretty much the most civil BT'er I know. I just think that you should stop discarding inconvenient facts.

    By the way, I (nor anyone else) is advocating that we let criminals off the hook.

     
  • At Wed Jul 25, 05:28:00 p.m. EDT, Blogger rob said…

    That should have read "so incurious about facts..."

     
  • At Wed Jul 25, 06:17:00 p.m. EDT, Anonymous Anonymous said…

    As usual, the CPC are misleading the facts with rhetoric - as in "it's the Liberals' fault".

    I find it so hard to believe that people fall for this garbage.

    How about "preventing" crime so that it doesn't happen as often?

    Duh!

     
  • At Wed Jul 25, 08:11:00 p.m. EDT, Blogger Christian Conservative said…

    "How about "preventing" crime so that it doesn't happen as often?"

    I'm all for that... problem is, how do we change the mentality of people with the old-fashioned idea "breaking the law is bad"?

    This may be overly simplistic of me, but the idea of the criminal being a "victim of the system" just doesn't wash... to me, that just seems like justifying the criminal, and fostering a sense of "I can't help myself" in those who commit crime.

    Rob, I don't ever mean to "I just think that you should stop discarding inconvenient facts", however, a lot of the "facts" that get entered into the debates we've had, in my opinion, come from biased sources with their own (often leftist) agendas. (ie - the CBC, etc.)

    That being said, I'd never want to lower the level of debate. I did read the link you sent me, I just didn't find the Senator's comments (that Cerberus reference) to fully address the charge that they are holding up parts of our agenda, including some of our crime bills... to be honest, she seemed to be trying to deflect the question.

    For the record, when I have time, I do try to read the things people send me, to try to keep the level of debate credible. ;-)

     
  • At Wed Jul 25, 09:59:00 p.m. EDT, Blogger Drew Costen said…

    This may be overly simplistic of me, but the idea of the criminal being a "victim of the system" just doesn't wash... to me, that just seems like justifying the criminal, and fostering a sense of "I can't help myself" in those who commit crime.

    Here's what it comes down to. Everything a person does is for a reason and has a cause. This means we need to find out what the reasons and causes for each individual crime are (I'm sure it will be different in many cases) and then figure out how to eliminate those causes.

     
  • At Wed Jul 25, 10:00:00 p.m. EDT, Blogger Drew Costen said…

    Oh, and simply saying "the cause is sin" doesn't help in any realistic manner, as accurate as such a statement may or may not be. :)

     
  • At Thu Jul 26, 06:50:00 a.m. EDT, Blogger Dirk said…

    Another inconvenient fact: the Canadian crime rate is steadily becoming lower (link:

    The crime issue is an easy one for political types to rant about as there are always headlines about the latest set of heinous crimes, and it's easy to point to those and say things like "We need to do something..."

    Rob has some good points here about stiffer sentences not really being effective in fighting crime. It is bothersome that you'd dismiss these studies because of a perceived political bias. I've read enough of those reports to see that there are facts there worth mining -- in other words stuff that transcends bias. Facts like this: when stiffer sentences (even as stiff as the death penalty) are imposed, there is rarely a correlation to lower crime rates.

     
  • At Thu Jul 26, 06:53:00 a.m. EDT, Blogger Dirk said…

    "That being said, I'd never want to lower the level of debate."

    Yet you continue to use the "not a leader" label for anything related to Dion.

     
  • At Thu Jul 26, 12:07:00 p.m. EDT, Blogger Brian VandenBerg said…

    "Yet you continue to use the "not a leader" label for anything related to Dion. "

    Dirk, the facts speak for themselves. Dion is not a leader. Get your head out of the sand.

     
  • At Thu Jul 26, 02:37:00 p.m. EDT, Blogger rob said…

    Dirk, the facts speak for themselves.

    To which facts are you referring?

     

Post a Comment

<< Home