Let’s talk about Canada. Home of the free health care, old-age monthly checks for everyone — a homeless person would receive a monthly check for $1,100 dollars. I have worked all my life and my Social Security check is not much better than that.
A place that, of course, has problems but also has opportunities. One of the lowest crime rates in the world and relatively few violent crimes. Strict, strict gun control laws. On my last night there, I watched a CBC documentary on guns, and it traced the life story of one gun from its birth and purchase in Texas and its involvement in drugs and crime and the death of its first owner who ran drugs and was 17; its ultimate arrival at a store (a gun store) in Georgia; its travel up the gray steel highway (as it’s called) to New York; and, finally, its arrival in Montreal.
Here it was held by another 17-year-old boy in his bedroom, kept at the ready for the U.S. drug dealer when he arrived in Canada. Dealers from the U.S. cross the border with drugs but hide their guns in Canada; these are often group guns much like the gun in Albany that mistakenly shot and killed a child and that destroyed two lives, the one that was shot and the young boy who did the shooting. Much like that tragedy, the younger brother (a 7-year-old) of the boy who was storing the weapon found the gun in a dresser drawer in the bedroom he shared with his brother. The 7-year-old and his friend started fighting over the gun and it went off, killing the child.
This is an old, old, tragic story. This gun’s history was traced through its serial number right back to square one. What is really horrifying is the gun store in Georgia where it was purchased. There is a comprehensive study (on computer) done by a U.S.-funded agency that traces guns used and reused in crime. This particular gun store, among the 80,000 gun stores in this country, came up eighth in the country for selling crime weapons, reusable guns. Someone would go in and buy 30 handguns (small and powerful) at a time almost every week and then send them up the gray steel highway to Brooklyn and New Jersey. The involvement of the NRA in keeping these stores open is another tale to tell.
This documentary had the former lawyer of the NRA speak about lies and guns and politics. A whistle- blower extraordinaire. Why did I have to go to Canada to view this expose on American gun addiction?
We don’t need weapons to protect ourselves from crime. We need laws to protect ourselves from weapons. I see this all around the streets of Schenectady. Guns like high-tech toys, better than video games, better than sex…More
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