From: owner-can-firearms-digest@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca (Cdn-Firearms Digest) To: cdn-firearms-digest@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca Subject: Cdn-Firearms Digest V6 #746 Reply-To: cdn-firearms-digest@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca Sender: owner-can-firearms-digest@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca Errors-To: owner-can-firearms-digest@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca Precedence: normal Cdn-Firearms Digest Thursday, December 11 2003 Volume 06 : Number 746 In this issue: Letter: Goodale pro-Martin PR incredible WORLD NEWS: Brazil set to bring in tough gun controls Column: An odd view of poachers: the nice guys next door Tough anti-gun law Letter: Fond memories of target shooting with pellet guns at the YMCA GUNSMOKE RANGE A THROWBACK TO OLD WEST Ram hunt has diminishing returns is this the last word? Changed Status of Colt '51 Navy Can't Reach Moderator RE: is this the last word? ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 09:29:23 -0600 (CST) From: "Breitkreuz, Garry - Assistant 1" Subject: Letter: Goodale pro-Martin PR incredible PUBLICATION: The StarPhoenix (Saskatoon) DATE: 2003.12.11 EDITION: Final SECTION: Forum PAGE: A15 BYLINE: Helen Hollingsworth SOURCE: The StarPhoenix - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- Goodale pro-Martin PR incredible - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- In our mail recently, we received a "feel good" little flyer from Ralph Goodale. In it, he extolled the virtues of a Paul Martin government. Our household will be returning his little piece of paper with a cover sheet listing all of the scandals his Liberal organization has foisted on Canadians. 1. Liberal Red Book lies. 2. Advertising scandals. 3. A devastated military. 4. The $1-billion (and counting) gun registry fiasco. Martin implemented the single largest tax increase in Canadian history, with the boost to CPP premiums, and yet his company (which he has signed over to his kids) -- Canadian Steamship Lines -- has seven ships that are flagged abroad and are not subject to Canadian income tax. It's a fine how-do-you-do, particularly for poor Canadians who start paying income taxes after earning just $7,765. Meanwhile, Martin, who's a multi-millionaire, just pulls a different flag up the staff of his ships and presto -- no tax! How can someone who has been so much a part of the problem ever deliver a solution? The UN says Canada has fallen to 16th from ninth place as the best country in which to live. Readers who feel the way I do should let Goodale know how they feel. Send his propaganda back. Send a strong message to Martin that we have had enough. Helen Hollingsworth Saskatoon ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 09:36:38 -0600 (CST) From: "Breitkreuz, Garry - Assistant 1" Subject: WORLD NEWS: Brazil set to bring in tough gun controls PUBLICATION: Financial Times DATE: 2003-12-11 WORDS: 161 BYLINE: By RAYMOND COLITT DATELINE: SAO PAULO PAGE: Page 6 EDITION: USA Ed2 SECTION: WORLD NEWS - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- WORLD NEWS: Brazil set to bring in tough gun controls NEWS DIGEST - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- President Luiz InacioLula da Silva of Brazil is expected to sign into law tough gun controls approved by Congress this week in an effort to curb one of the worlds highest homicide rates. The legislation, which tightens rules on possessing and selling guns, calls for a referendum - the first ever in Brazil - on a complete ban of arms sales. Many of Brazils cities are regularly terrorised by waves of violence, in part drug-related. Last year alone nearly 49,000 people were killed in Brazil, an estimated 90 per cent of them by firearms. Large anti-gun protests this year helped force the legislature to approve the proposals, which had been stuck in Congress for years. Opinion polls show nearly two-thirds of Brazilians favour a complete ban on gun ownership. Raymond Colitt, Sao Paulo Full story, www.ft.com/ americas ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 09:36:39 -0600 (CST) From: "Breitkreuz, Garry - Assistant 1" Subject: Column: An odd view of poachers: the nice guys next door PUBLICATION: Calgary Herald DATE: 2003.12.11 EDITION: Final SECTION: Sports PAGE: F6 COLUMN: Outdoors BYLINE: Bob Scammell SOURCE: For The Calgary Herald ILLUSTRATION: Colour Photo: Bob Scammell, For The Calgary Herald / When itcomes to poaching, masters avoid witnesses. - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- An odd view of poachers: the nice guys next door - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- "There is perhaps no better way of studying an art than examining the technique of the masters. . . . Poaching is said to be a dying art, but I do not believe this. No great art dies. Congenital poachers will father poachers. It is an old thing. Hunting is in the blood." - -- The Poacher's Handbook, Ian Niall You could tell it was a master coming: in a van, lights out, creeping along the remote dead-end road just behind the school bus. Masters avoid witnesses. I was waiting for legal shooting light before wading, for the first time this past season, in to a certain frozen stump. The van stopped in a big dip in the road. After two or three minutes there was a rifle shot, then some backing and angling the vehicle. Now my binoculars showed a rifle pointing out the driver's window and another shot was quickly fired. Five minutes later a tall man got out, and trudged in to the ridge toward which he had been shooting. Five or 10 minutes later, another shot sounded. My theory is that anyone who will break one law will break them all. So I waited to see what was dragged out, hoping to check later if the registered owner of the vehicle had the licence for the animal. But it took too long and I had an appointment elsewhere. When I returned something had been dragged out of there on some sort of sled. That I would like to have seen, because I have dragged too many out the hard way. The van had turned around and headed back to the dead end, so I followed. It had gone into private land where some hunters have set up a camp. Now I know the name of the registered owner of the van, but I would not be able to identify the driver and shooter. When I was relating the story later to some hunting friends one got annoyed and demanded to know why I called the driver a poacher. Well, I explained, poaching is taking fish and game by trespassing or in violation of law, nothing more, nothing less. The van driver had committed at least two offences against the Wildlife Act and regulations: having a loaded firearm in a vehicle and discharging a firearm from a developed road. North Americans have a curiously romantic attitude toward poachers, thinking only in terms of gangs of organized night-lighters and market hunters rather than the too-common case of the nice gent next door who hunts, but secretly believes the rules are for wimps. Years ago Lloyd Graff, my deceased hunting buddy, and I saw a hunter in broad daylight shoot off the hood of a vehicle parked on major pavement directly over a NO HUNTING sign at a small mule deer buck snuffling alfalfa in a field full of horses. The shooter was a kid on his first hunt and his dad kept snivelling: "I wanted it to be a memorable day." No masters, they, just a fledgling poacher being fathered. We gave them the name, address and telephone number of the landowner and told dad he had a week to see that the landowner called to tell us what he wanted done. When the landowner called he thanked us for our concern, said he did not wish to press charges, that he "accepted their apology, but not their explanation." One evening a few years ago I was on stand in a field of swathed oats and alfalfa on which only I had permission. There was a shot from the road and I heard the bullet hit something unseen in the gully that bisected the field. From a well-hidden gate a truck roared into the field and into the gully. Something thumped into the truck bed and the truck sped back out. Elapsed time: four minutes. Masters again . . . I reported to the kindly but naive landowner. "Aw that's just the ------ brothers," he told me, naming notorious neighbours, "they need the meat." They did: to feed their dogs, other locals told me, who had heard the brothers brag about it. Could it be that so many of our solid-citizen hunters, the nice guys next door, just have to poach even when they don't need to under our generous, democratic fish and game laws? bscam@telusplanet.net ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 09:36:40 -0600 (CST) From: "Breitkreuz, Garry - Assistant 1" Subject: Tough anti-gun law PUBLICATION: Montreal Gazette DATE: 2003.12.11 EDITION: Final SECTION: News PAGE: A16 COLUMN: In Brief SOURCE: AP; Washington Post; Knight Ridder Newspapers; New YorkTimes DATELINE: Brazil - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- Tough anti-gun law - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- New legislation passed by Brazil's Congress will give one of the world's most homicidal countries the toughest gun laws in South America. The hitch is that the law would cover legal gun sales, not widespread black-market arms dealing. The new measure raises the minimum age for gun ownership in Brazil to 25 from 21, severely restricts carrying handguns in public and requires background checks of potential gun buyers. It makes cross-border gunrunning a felony and calls for a referendum on Oct. 2, 2005, to determine whether to ban handgun sales in Brazil. - ----------------------------------- PUBLICATION: The Province DATE: 2003.12.11 EDITION: Final SECTION: News PAGE: A13 COLUMN: World Briefing SOURCE: News Services DATELINE: RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- Brazil gets tougher gun controls, vote - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- RIO DE JANEIRO, Brazil -- New legislation passed by Congress will give one of the world's most homicidal nations the toughest gun laws in South America. The new measure raises the minimum age for gun ownership to 25 from 21, severely restricts carrying handguns in public and requires background checks of potential gun buyers. It also calls for a referendum on Oct. 2, 2005, to determine whether to ban handgun sales. About 40,000 people a year die in homicides, most due to gun violence. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 09:36:41 -0600 (CST) From: "Breitkreuz, Garry - Assistant 1" Subject: Letter: Fond memories of target shooting with pellet guns at the YMCA PUBLICATION: The Hamilton Spectator DATE: 2003.12.11 SECTION: Opinion PAGE: A21 BYLINE: Barb Joy, Stoney Creek - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- Safety course might help; Pellet guns - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- I have very fond memories of target shooting with pellet guns at the YMCA years ago. I was taught proper etiquette and safety rules for handling these guns. I have not looked around lately for information for similar courses to teach children proper safety rules, but I doubt they would have an impact on the social misfit that engages in criminal behaviour. I do remember stories of children misusing pellet guns when I was involved with them, but that made me more wary when handling them because of the power they had to hurt. Perhaps a solution would be to require a safety course certificate prior to purchase for all pellet guns. This solution may not expose the social misfits. It would encourage safe handling of these guns and may get people to pause and think before their buddies talk them into doing stupid things. Banning them outright removes the potential joy of a child developing a skill in the real world, instead of in the virtual world of shooter video games. Some might suggest that video games are suitable venues for this but I would like to encourage involvement in the real world. Being able to press the reset button is not the same as holding the target in your hand and being able to take it to your parents to show them how good you are getting. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 09:36:41 -0600 (CST) From: "Breitkreuz, Garry - Assistant 1" Subject: GUNSMOKE RANGE A THROWBACK TO OLD WEST PUBLICATION: The Calgary Sun DATE: 2003.12.11 EDITION: Final SECTION: Travel PAGE: 45 ILLUSTRATION: photo by TROY MABEN, AP RELOAD ... A participant in 19th century regalia shoots at targets at the Blacks Creek Public Rifle Range outside Boise, Idaho. BYLINE: AP DATELINE: BOISE, Idaho - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- GUNSMOKE RANGE A THROWBACK TO OLD WEST - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- A blur of fire-spitting six-guns, rifles and shotguns transforms the quiet desert plinking ground at Blacks Creek Public Rifle Range twice a month. The dusty sagebrush desert makes a perfect backdrop for the more than 75 participants who get gussied up in 19th-century costume to socialize and compete in Cowboy Action Shooting, a fantasy sport that combines a heap of historical flavour with rapid-fire target shooting. For a few hours a month, ordinary people become steely eyed lawmen or bad-news drifters. At least in their own minds, they become Jesse James, Wyatt Earp or Annie Oakley. "This is a chance to do what I was doing when I was 10 or 11 years old out in my backyard -- only now I can do it with real guns," said Ray Walters, a 55-year-old former firefighter. The competition, governed by the Single Action Shooting Society, has existed since the early 1980s. There are numerous styles of match competition, from mounted pistol shooting, to short-range derringer competitions, to long-range rifle shoots. Most common are medium-range pistol, rifle and shotgunning games. Matches are divided into eight or 10 scenarios, called "stages." Shooters fire through a doorway, around a corner or out of a window at steel squares, circles or small cowboy silhouettes from 4.5 to 13.5 metres away. They use multiple combinations of pistols, rifles and shotguns. A timer keeps electronic track of how long it takes a competitor to shoot through the stage -- which usually lasts less than a minute. Official observers watch for safety violations, gun handling problems and target misses, which can add time to the overall score. Competition is friendly because there's no prize or cash award winners -- just bragging rights and belt buckles. But even at that, devoted shooters practise hours a day. Just like in the Old West, women are toting guns at the matches along with the menfolk. Sharon Wright, who shoots as "Six-gun Sam," has won two state championships. Before she got involved four years ago, she had never fired a gun. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 09:36:43 -0600 (CST) From: "Breitkreuz, Garry - Assistant 1" Subject: Ram hunt has diminishing returns PUBLICATION GLOBE AND MAIL DATE: THU DEC.11,2003 PAGE: A13 (ILLUS) BYLINE: ANNE MCILROY, SCIENCE REPORTER CLASS: National News EDITION: National DATELINE: WORDS: 565 - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- Ram hunt has diminishing returns Quest for horns of Alberta bighorn sheep reducing size of prize, research study says - ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- - ---- Hunters will pay up to $1-million for the right to kill a bighorn sheep in Alberta. But a new study suggests they may be unwittingly reducing the size of the trophies they prize. Horn size is 25-per-cent shorter, on average, than it was 30 years ago, biologist David Coltman said, and there is strong evidence that hunting has played a major role in the shrinkage of the rams' distinctive coiled horns. The problem is that hunters are killing the male animals with the most impressive horns before they have time to produce many offspring. This has evolutionary consequences, since knocking off the large-horned males means those with smaller horns have more success in passing their genes to the next generation, said Dr. Coltman, who published the findings in today's edition of the British journal Nature. There are roughly 6,000 to 8,000 bighorn sheep in Alberta, and about 200 trophy rams are killed every year, said Jon Jorgenson, a researcher with the Alberta Department of Sustainable Resource Development, who co-authored the study. He has been monitoring one population of bighorn sheep since 1978, one of several researchers who have taken part in the longest and most detailed study in the world on the animals. The Ram Mountain Study, as it is known, was the basis for the genetics work that allowed Dr. Coltman to show that the big-horned rams were getting killed before they reached their reproductive peak. In most of the province, it is legal to kill rams once their horns have grown to four-fifths of a total curl, or circle. But some fast-growing rams develop horns this big before they reach roughly age 6. That is when they are strong enough to hold their own in the annual rut, and win the right to be king of the mountain and mate with most of the females. By killing rams before they reach 6, hunters are actually helping the smaller horned rams have more offspring. "This shows us we need to reassess the way we have been hunting trophy rams in this province," Mr. Jorgenson said. In a few parts of the province, rams have to have a fully curled horn before they can be hunted. This might be one option for protecting the fast-growing rams. Another option is to regulate the number of hunters. Albertans pay only $48.59 for a licence to hunt bighorn sheep; about 2,000 licences are issued every year. Foreigners must pay $300, but have to hunt with an outfitter-guide, which can cost $10,000 or more. Once a year, there is an auction for a one-time permit for foreigners that would give a hunter a much better chance of killing a bighorn sheep with large horns. It has gone for upward of $1-million. Is there a chance that the trend toward smaller horns might be good for the bighorn sheep, since hunters would no longer consider them such a prize? Definitely not, said Dr. Coltman. "For the sheep, we don't really know what the long-term consequences might be," he said. It may be that genes that cause rams to grow large horns also help determine fertility and body size in females. Knocking off the males with the big horns might have detrimental effects on the population as a whole, he said. ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 10:18:53 -0600 (CST) From: paul chicoine Subject: is this the last word? All men are to blame for violence The Gazette Thursday, December 11, 2003 I was very pleased to see two of your columnists, Jack Todd and James Mennie, speak out against men's violence in the wake of the recent rape of a 14-year-old girl in Candiac and the murder of Tammara Shaikh. Yet some of your male readers seem to be outraged at the idea that men should bear collective responsibility for these acts. If men still rape and batter at such a staggering rate even in supposedly enlightened Western countries, it's because on some level they feel they have a right to, if not a duty. They are acting out on countless messages sent to them by our culture about the nature of women and the nature of manhood. And the effect of their actions - in addition to keeping all women in a state of fear - is to send a message to all men that despite the progress women have made in these last decades, they can still be put in their place, that men are still boss. In this sense it can be said that all men benefit from rape as well as from other male acts of violence against women. And that's why men bear collective responsibility for this violence. Lise Weil Montreal © Copyright 2003 Montreal Gazette ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 10:50:25 -0600 (CST) From: "Todd Birch" Subject: Changed Status of Colt '51 Navy I have received notification from Registration Services Manager M. Laurent Lemelin of the CFR that my Colt 2nd Generation '51 Navy has been reclassified as "non-antique". The letter states that "...further information on this firearm was found and our Firearms Technician has determined that the firearm you requested to have de-registered last May 2003 is in fact a Colt model 1851 2nd Generation which was manufactured between 1971 and 1986." Really? No kidding? All of this is a regurgitation of the conversation I had with the agent of the CFC I was dealing with when I applied for the transfer of the gun to my name. I repeatedly pointed out the origin of the revolver and was adamantly informed that in fact it was de-registerable as an "antique". The letter is dated December 03/03. It has taken the system and their "Firearms Technician" nearly five months to properly identify and correctly classify this revolver after I scanned them full views of the revolver beside an Italian made '51 Navy at the time of application. This took repeated attempts as the first two email addresses supplied were invalid. There is no admission of error on the part of the CFR. In fact, there is an inference that I incorrectly applied to have the status of the revolver changed. M. Lemelin did not wish to discuss with me on the phone the effects that this error may have had on my firearms rights had it come to light at the border or elsewhere that I was in possession of an incorrectly registered firearm. Nor did he wish to discuss the "politics" of the inefficiency of the $1.3 billion CFR and the incompetence of it's agents. It is staggering to consider the reluctance of the government to admit the failure of this piece of social re-engineering. As someone has pointed out on the Digest, the greater crime is the disillusionment it creates in the minds of the people for government in general. The lack of respect for politicians and the corrupt system they represent is endemic in Canadian society. How can anyone with even a modicum of life experience believe anything that comes out of the mouth of a politician, regardless of stripe? Lies, damned lies and political statements - take your pick. The bigger the lie, the more likelihood of being accepted and propagated by the liberal media. Todd Birch ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 10:55:22 -0600 (CST) From: Phil Cottrell Subject: Can't Reach Moderator Not only did a post of mine never appear on Tuesday, when I went to query the moderator, here is what I got in return: Your message cannot be delivered to the following recipients: Recipient address: moderator1@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca Reason: Remote SMTP server has rejected address Diagnostic code: smtp;550 : User unknown in local recipient table Remote system: dns;broadway.sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca (TCP|10.0.120.163|59563|198.169.128.1|25) (broadway.sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca ESMTP Postfix) The moderator's email is : moderator1@hitchen.org I have no idea why your posting wasn't reproduced though, unless it came through as non-member and was deleted. I certainly do not reject a posting without contacting the poster with the reason why. Gordon Hitchen moderator1@hitchen.org ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 11 Dec 2003 11:38:23 -0600 (CST) From: "Jason Hayes - HHC" Subject: RE: is this the last word? No it's not the last word, but it is an unfortunate truth that a person as dedicated to an irrational hate as Ms. Weil is unlikely to abandon their bigotry no matter what you say. In reply ... Sent to: letters@thegazette.canwest.com Re: "All men are to blame for violence". If Ms. Weil's diatribe against men discussed (almost) any other definable group, she would be quickly charged with a hate crime. However, her anger is allowed in deference to the feeling of helplessness that many have when confronted with the deranged actions of a very few sick individuals. Ms. Weil cannot personally stop the violence, so she engages in a more socially acceptable form of violence herself, as a means of protecting her fragile and hate-filled world view that all men are evil and all men profit from the violent crime of rape. It is truly unfortunate that so many still succumb to the bigoted foolishness that Ms. Weil so willingly embraces. Men, as a whole, are no more responsible for the crime of rape than women, as a whole, are responsible for the crimes committed by Andrea Yates or Susan Smith. An individual is responsible for the choices they make and the outcomes of those choices. Individuals who take part in violent crimes against others must be individually punished for those crimes. One cannot rationally blame an entire gender, color or faith for the sins of a few. As in all cases of bigotry, ignorance breeds hatred. Ms. Weil's case is clearly no different. - ------------------------ Jason Hayes - Principal Hayes Holdings Consulting hh@hayz.ws / www.hayz.ws Blog: www.hayz.ws/blog #1936 - 246 Stewart Green SW Calgary, AB, Canada T3H 3C8 - ------------------------ ------------------------------ End of Cdn-Firearms Digest V6 #746 ********************************** Submissions: mailto:cdn-firearms-digest@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca Mailing List Commands: mailto:majordomo@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca Moderator's e-mail address: mailto:moderator@hitchen.org List owner: mailto:owner-cdn-firearms@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca FAQ list: http://www.magma.ca/~asd/cfd-faq1.html and http://teapot.usask.ca/cdn-firearms/Faq/cfd-faq1.html Web Site: http://teapot.usask.ca/cdn-firearms/homepage.html FTP Site: ftp://teapot.usask.ca/pub/cdn-firearms/ CFDigest Archives: http://www.sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca/~ab133/ or put the next command in an e-mail message and mailto:majordomo@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca get cdn-firearms-digest v04.n192 end (192 is the digest issue number and 04 is the volume) To unsubscribe from _all_ the lists, put the next five lines in a message and mailto:majordomo@sfn.saskatoon.sk.ca unsubscribe cdn-firearms-digest unsubscribe cdn-firearms-alert unsubscribe cdn-firearms-chat unsubscribe cdn-firearms end (To subscribe, use "subscribe" instead of "unsubscribe".) 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