6 December 2024
The Trudeau Government has been rotting from inactivity as the House remains at loggerheads over their refusal to release unredacted documents concerning Sustainable Development Technology Canada aka the ‘Green Slush Fund.’ This, despite the terrible optics surrounding the growing scandal and you know being told by the Speaker of the House that they should.
Having realized that they need to look like they are doing something the Trudeau Government has begun scraping the bottom of the barrel for shameless scams to appear government like. First there was the GST holiday widely criticized by economists as not only ineffective but actually damaging.
Now, on Thursday the Trudeau Government decided to dust off a classic which at this point is so cliché its basically self-parody. The ‘in case of emergency break glass’ strategy of stoking firearms debate when in trouble is a well-known and politically craven strategy utilized at moments of crisis by the Trudeau Government over the past several years.
In a new twist, after banning every semi-auto they could find to list, including .22s which is downright ridiculous (except of course the SKS to avoid a repeat confrontation with First Nations) they took the gambit a step further. In what can only be described as incredibly dishonest or incredibly stupid move Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc has now claimed that the Trudeau Government is investigating transferring these newly prohibited firearms to Ukraine once they are confiscated from retailers.
Here’s the thing, it’s total bullshit. Let’s ignore the obvious, this Government is…I am loathed to borrow this from the US, but a lame duck. They have lost the election; it just hasn’t happened yet. Every day they slip in the polls and lose any semblance of legitimacy they have left. The guy who is going to replace them is running on, in part, reversing this firearms ‘plan’ (I use that term loosely), which has the support of the majority of Canadians who would rather the energy and funds go towards tackling illegal handguns.
Ignoring all that, the government still doesn’t actually have a system in place to collect these firearms, nor compensate retailers. By the time they do they will be out of office. Were this not the case, by the time they are collected and sorted and sent over the war in Ukraine might very well be over if we don’t start sending them real heavy military support, like yesterday. On that last point the Ukrainians don’t need a handful of small arms, they need real military equipment, like anti-aircraft.
Now let’s talk about these guns. To start, calling something “military-style” (a totally made up term) does not make it any more appropriate for a military. This is pure political theater. These are civilian semi-automatics, largely of outdated designs, that have absolutely zero place on a battlefield.
There are a few standouts that would be useful, such as the CZ Bren which is a fabulous weapon. However, I would be surprised if there were even 200 of these in Canada since they run almost $5,000 (include taxes) a pop. For that price I can buy two 1998 Jeep TJs on auto trader and send them over which would probably be more useful to the Ukrainians than one rifle.
These weapons will require conversion to select fire allowing full auto. For the Ukrainians this means either sourcing parts from the manufacturer or mickey-mousing up something of their own. Now don’t get me wrong the Ukrainian resourcefulness is worthy of high praise, but hear me out, instead of sending a soldier into the field with some jenky conversion kit we could just go to Colt Canada (or another arms manufacturer in NATO, which includes four of the six largest arms manufactures in the world) and buy them, you know, actually military weapons, instead of ‘military-style’, whatever the hell that is.
On the point of conversion, we are talking about a hodgepodge of different rifles that are in several different calibers, and many require proprietary magazines to boot, which will also need to be converted to high capacity. This is not how you fight a war, you want simplicity, uniformity, and reliability. What you don’t want is a bunch of Ukrainians trying to take a random grab bag of rifles and rig up some jenky select fire, figure out how to source correct caliber ammunition, and find mags. It’s honest to God insulting to the point I want to puke.
The Trudeau Government if being serious in making this suggestion is incredibly stupid. They likely know everything I just said (God I hope so anyway because if they don’t that’s terrifying), which means they are just lying and think you’re stupid. This is shameless political theater which, in classic Trudeau fashion is designed to find a political wedge issue, sharpen it, and jam it into Canadians with as much force as possible. In this case tying it to support for Ukraine is a sickeningly new level of depravity.
I don’t care how you feel about firearms here in Canada, full disclosure I am a gun owner, and I think things were pretty ok before Trudeau messed about with it for political gain. I don’t care if you support Ukraine (you should), I do and I said NATO should have been on the ground day one. Regardless of whether you agree with the above or not, what you should care about is having a government that is either stupid or lying to you. This little extra cherry they threw on top of their latest wedge is just beyond the pale. This is about looking busy, I for one will continue to demand my Government does a hell of a lot more than just talk about Ukraine and I certainly won’t tolerate them exploiting the crisis in Ukraine for shameless partisan advantage.
You should be outraged beyond words. God knows I am.
Feature Photo: Public Safety Minister Dominic LeBlanc, [0q2a8334_34921286774_o] New Brunswick 2017. Wikimedia Commons, 2024.
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