Actually, more recent numbers for Canada’s registration system are in: Gun registry will cost $1 billion
In fairness, the article quotes the government thusly:
There’s no real need to steal more guns, DaddyMack. The following goes into just how easy it is to make one:
http://www.kurtsaxon.com/pdf_files/4windssg.zip
(I ran into the URL the other day on Usenet’s rec.guns newsgroup, where they discuss the topic occasionally.)
Criminals just steal guns because they’re fundamentally lazy, but if guns become too hard to get, I’m sure one of the less lazy ones will start manufacturing these for sale to his friends, and his friends’ friends, and his friends’ friends’ friends.
Sten submachineguns are almost as easy: a piece of automotive muffler pipe, a spring, a chunk of 9mm barrel, a bit of sheet metal, and a couple of inches of bar stock to fit inside the pipe will do just fine – if you don’t want to pay Sarco $79.95 for the parts kit (not including the piece of pipe, which you can buy from CatCo along with a convenient cutting template, for a mere $39.95 – or hit your local metal supply shop and buy a piece of DOM 4140 tubing for $10 and download the template off the web).
L. Neil Smith also has gun plans somewhere on WebleyWeb, if I recall correctly. And of course WetWorx.com has CAD drawings for AR-15 receivers, auto-sears, and “lightning links”, as well as full-auto conversions for Glock handguns.
Now some moron will come up with the idea of restricting ammunition, not understanding that Army Improvised Munitions Manual TM-31-210 (commonly available just about anywhere; I was given my first copy at age nine) goes into detail on how to “roll your own” from common materials in the event that you can’t buy a box of ammo from WalMart and don’t have any stockpiled in the basement. (Hmm. Speaking of which, I’m running low on .308 – I’d better do some reloading this weekend.)
Well I’m done.
IMHO Zwaldd’s logic switch has malfunctioned.
I know, bad form to respond to myself. But I should have pointed out that in Britain, now that they’ve banned most guns, the criminals are simply importing them. And since it’s just as easy to smuggle in a small machine gun as it is to smuggle in a handgun, the criminals have increased their firepower.
So I guess the criminals are too lazy even to make their own when they can’t steal them. 
Probably cuts into the profits of the drug-smuggling rings, though, since guns are bulkier than drugs for the same dollar (or pound-sterling, or peso, or Canadian wastepaper) value.
Why do Aussies oil their gardens?
So their guns won’t rust.
I decided to peek at Yahoo, and they just updated the editorials in their “Gun Control” full-coverage section:
“Four Years After the Dunblane Massacre, Britain’s Tighter Gun Laws Have Failed Completely”
http://www.thevanguard.org/thevanguard/other_writers/woolrich.shtml
Not that zwaldd will pay any attention, but Britain had registered all guns for years, and banned and confiscated nearly all of them after the Dunblane massacre. Yet another example of registration leading inexorably to confiscation, while failing to accomplish anything regarding controlling the criminal element.
How many of those Beretta submachine guns were registered, do you think?? 
i don’t know how much more clear i can make my point: there is no precedent in the united states of america for a registration leading to a ban. the federal government can’t ban guns due to the second amendment. therefore it is unreasonable and illogical to argue that a national registration program will lead to a ban. britain does not have a right to bear arms in their national charter, nor do they have a powerful gun lobby. i think this is an important distinction. i have argued that california’s gun bans were not based on a registration program. if you want to argue my point, you have to say that the american right to bear arms does not guarantee our right to bear arms or show evidence that a registration program in the usa was used to confiscate guns. try and understand my position so you can argue it intelligently.
Ah, but, even without repealing the amendment (which would be the honest way of going about a gun ban), a de facto ban could occur. For example, the government might so tightly restrict the type of arms that may be owned/purchased/carried that the right becomes effectively meaningless. One municipality interpreted the state constitution’s right to bear arms to allow the outright banning of certain “types” of firearms, and believed “handguns” to be such a type. It’s not outside the realm of possibility that something similar might happen at the federal level, if the wrong people come to power in the appropriate places.
Yet another way a de facto ban might occur: making the “right” so expensive and difficult, by requiring registration fees, transfer fees, background check fees and forms, training fees, pricey storage methods, and what have you, that people eventually throw up their hands and decide that the cost and time involved in owning a firearm is just not worth it. Many gun control advocates would be perfectly happy with such a scenario.
In short: the Second Amendment should protect the right of the people to keep and bear arms, but you can’t hang your hat on it as an eternal guarantee. Them gun-control types can be mighty sneaky.
And I don’t know how much more obtuse you can be about it: California registered certain firearms, then banned them. New York City required registration of all guns, then banned certain types.
While we’re at it, in 1993, then-SecTreas Lloyd Bentsen, at the urging of his boss, Bill Clinton, reinterpreted federal law in a bizarre and twisted fashion to mean that he could recategorize, by model, certain guns to be “destructive devices” – a category of weapons which requires onerous burdens on owners. The BATF then used the Form 4473 sheets to track down every single owner that they could and require the owner to either (1) pay a $200 tax, get fingerprinted, and get local law-enforcement signoff (often impossible), if they wanted to keep their gun; (2) sell it (at an enormous loss due to the restrictions) to someone willing and able to do (1); or (3) turn it in for destruction without any compensation.
Note that option (1) is often impossible not merely because the local police usually hate signing off on destructive-device paperwork, but also because many states ban such devices in the hands of citizens. My current home, Washington state, prohibits them.
The type of firearm? 12ga shotguns with large magazines, designed to look ugly and “dangerous”. Functionally equivalent to (but not nearly as reliable as) a Remington 11-87 duck-hunting gun (approx $450) with a Choate extended magazine tube ($47.60 retail from Brownells).
Oh, will you hold your breath until you turn blue unless I say it?
I have provided three modern examples: NYC’s “assault weapon” ban, California’s “assault weapon” ban, and the backdoor ruling change by Bentsen which was enforced nationally – leaving owners of those guns nowhere to turn to for relief.
One can also make a case that the 1934 “National Firearms Act”, which imposed a $200 tax and mandatory registration on machine guns, silencers, and sawn-off rifles/shotguns, was in fact a registration-and-ban scheme, since many states now ban these items, and the tax itself was (in 1934) ten or more times the cost of most of those guns themselves.
Just because you want to deny the truth doesn’t make your argument any less of a pathetic evasion. Please weasel and squirm some more; it is moderately amusing.
i agree - guns can be and have been banned at the state level, completely unrelated to registration, and i do not support those bans. and while i would support altering the second amendment for clarity and relevance, i would not support eliminating it or changing it in a way that would deny americans the right to bear arms.
i agree with this as well. i would not support an unaffordable registration program. my original point in this thread was to argue ex-tank’s assertion that his claim of registration leading to confiscation was not slippery slope, and that california’s gun ban was an example. i argued that california’s gun ban was not dependent in any way on registration, and that there is no other real life (if that’s what he meant by ‘rl’) precedent of registration leading to a ban in this country, which is relevant because we’re the only country with a right to bear arms in its national charter. so is it agreed, based on the lack of evidence to the contrary, that, barring a repeal of the second amendment, the argument that ‘registration leads to bans and confiscation’ is unfounded?
just because registration may have occurred prior to a ban does not mean it was required to enact the ban or used to implement the ban. my understanding is that weapons made before the ban are still legal to own and sell. there may have been some made illegal across the board, but i haven’t seen one iota of evidence that a pre-ban registration program was used to track down and confiscate banned weapons. in the ‘gun registration’ thread i posted a link to this site -http://home1.gte.net/bblakley/ban/, which lists pre and post ban weapons in california, implying that the pre ban weapons are still legal and were not confiscated from registered owners. i don’t see how you’re linking some registration program with the ban. in fact this link -http://www.handguncontrol.org/stateleg/fedlaws.asp - states that california doesn’t even have a registration law, only a record of sale law. why do you think registered weapons were confiscated if you don’t have any evidence for it?
HCI’s page is false. California does require registration of weapons brought into the state within 30 days. Blakeley’s page isn’t about California laws, it’s about the federal 1994 Omnibus Crime Bill.
And you keep ignoring the simple fact that the “assault weapon” registration was in fact used to force owners to get rid of their SKSes, as discussed quite clearly at http://www.sksbuyback.com/
And you have completely ignored the 1993 confiscation of certain shotguns, due to Lloyd Bentsen’s reinterpretation of a 25-year-old law, that was made possible only because of the Form 4473 requirement that the feds have had around (which, incidentally, was part of the same 1968 law that Bentsen creatively reinterpreted).
In both the California SKS cases and the nationwide shotgun case, registration information was used to track down owners to force them to get rid of their guns.
Moreover, you still haven’t shown even one benefit from registration. No reduction in crime, no criminals blocked from stealing guns, nothing.
Why don’t you just admit that the emperor has no clothes?
Zwaldd: You are either a liar, or ignorant; both conditions are curable, however, so there’s hope for you yet.
Assault Weapon Registration Form
F.A.Q.: Assault Weapon Registration
I can’t belive you actually cited HCI. Try getting out into the real world for factual info. The PSOR is for every firearm transaction; “Assault Weapons” require registration.
If I can’t cite the NRA (which, BTW, helpfully provided links to the above Official State of California websites) as a “reliable, unbiased source”, you can’t cite HCI, or any other anti-gun organization, group, association, club, whatever.
You gotta make that turkey fly on its own, bud.
Look up the quagmire in California here. I’m sure other CA Dopers can give you a first-hand low-down on what they’ve been going through out there.
Dollars to doughnuts that some bright person is soon going to propose a handgun registration bill. After all, the Assault Weapon Registration scheme doesn’t seem to be curbing crime in the inner-city ghettos.
Well, zwaldd, I guess I don’t really need to follow up on your rebuttal to my post, since a calvacade of responses support my original premise. But, I must point out, if you are looking for de-facto gun bans, just look at Maryland. With the legislation helped enacted by gov. Glendening(sp?) (IMHO, geez, talk about a flaming Commie, sorry, sorry, sorry, I just had to spew with that one), with the mandatory smart gun bill, etc., etc., many gun manufacturers have curtailed shipments to MD because they cannot comply with the legislation so enacted. Consequently, already, the price of guns are rapidly climbing, and some gun shops have already run out of stock. What gun ban?!?!?!
Nownow, BF, don’t duck the issue.
That’s not an actual ban. :rolleyes:
Just thought that I’d beat Zwaldd to it, that’s all.
Bwuh-hahahahaha… ExTank, I wait with bated (baited with Bud breafus) for my slap-down from the honorable zwaldd!!
you need to go back and re-read that thread, bf. here’s a recap of my arguments against your points:
a) criminals don’t have to adhere to gun registration. that’s the beauty of it. you place the responsibility (what you call a burden) on law abiding citizens to obey the law. they’re the ones that take responsibility to make sure registrations are transfered before handing over a weapon. those intending to use a gun for criminal purposes will need to search far and wide for an untraceable gun. so instead of depending on criminals to obey the law, we let them sit back and watch their gun supply dwindle. **
Exactly. Why must I, Joe-law-abider, suffer the burden (and I think that’s apropo) to make sure the stuff I register, etc., be out of the hands of criminals. Canada has had a hand-gun registration since 1934, and their friggin’ AG says they have not solved one crime, or convicted one criminal, with a registered gun. Gee.
b) i have argued in this and other gun threads that there is no precedent in this country of registration leading to confiscation. it was suggested in this thread that registration led to a ban in california, although no pertinent evidence was given to support the claim.
Please see my previous post on Maryland, the land of the free.
c) you think 85 mil for a national registration program is exhorbitant? go back to the registration thread and read the estimates on page 1 regarding a cost of $3 per handgun registration. and that’s limiting it to handguns.
Ok, cheap shot by me. Supposedly there are 100 million handguns in the US. 3$ times 100 million is what? Cheap? To who? Again, who’s paying for this?
so if this is what you call ‘thoroughly deflated’ then i guess it’s another disagreement on definition of terms.
[QUOTE]
Your right.
71-hour achmed
ok, i’ll concede that california may have a registration law - i posted that link here since no one bothered to refute it the first time. HOWEVER, you still haven’t provided any definitive evidence that registration led to confiscation. that ‘sksbuyback’ link goes to some rambling, emotionally charged site that contains not a single quote of the actual regulations involved or a link to an unbiased site with that info. in fact, the only place in your link that appears to be going in that direction, specifically the first sentence under “WHAT WERE YOU THINKING”, contains a blind link. so that site is pure nonesense. and if you didn’t like the blakely page, ex tank provided a cite which further proves that registered weapons werre not confiscated.
ex tank
hey, i know enough not to cite a gun control site for evidence that registration doesn’t lead to confiscation. if you’ll notice, i only referred to the info on which states have registration laws, since no one contested it before. as i said, i’ll concede they were wrong.
thanks for the link, ex tank. you’ve proven my point. that link contains a faq regarding registration that supports my claim that registered weapons are not confiscated. here’s one of several examples:
8. I have a registered assault weapon. If I travel outside of California with the firearm, can I bring the firearm back into California?
Yes, as a long as it is transported in accordance with Penal Code sections 12285 and 12026.1. These sections of law may be accessed on the DOJ Firearms Division Website’s Online Dangerous Weapons Control Laws.
in other words, if i registered an assault weapon, i can travel out of and back into california and IT WILL NOT BE CONFISCATED. thank you for that. it will come in handy in future debates.
i really think your quote here points to the crux of the misunderstanding. you imply that if maryland did have a ban, then bf’s point would be relevant. from what i understand, state bans are constitutional. i’m not arguing that guns can’t be banned. the 2nd as it stands prevents the fed from banning guns. for bf’s point to be relevant to the argument, maryland would have had to set up a registration program and then used the information to sweep down and confiscate registered guns. didn’t happen, and until someone can provide unbiased documentation regarding a registration program that involves confiscation (sorry 71 hour achmed, but your sksbuyback link looks like it was written by the toothless guy from deliverance and i ain’t buyin’ it), i stand on my conviction. also, if y’all want to debate the pros and cons of registration, open a new thread or bump the old ‘handgun registration’ thread.
…meaning things like cost and burden. let’s finish debating “registered guns will be banned and confiscated” in this thread. for this discussion to have even a hint of linearity we should stay focused.
Well Bunky I’ll say it one more time.
Registration has led to confiscation ,or at least an ultimatum
Registration is the first step toward banning.
Registration is the first step toward confiscation.
Quote Zwaldd
now that i agree with. if you read my posts carefully, you’ll see that i specifically stated that in no way would i support legislation to confiscate guns or prevent people from buying and selling guns. i am a gun owner and would not want any restrictions placed on me about what type or quantity of gun i can buy. i wouldn’t support a registration program that included such restrictions.
We are not talking about you.Assuming you really are a gun owner. I’m guessing it is a staple gun.
We are saying you cannot take back what you have given up.You seem to think you will be able to control it.
Quote
you’ll see that i specifically stated that in no way would i support legislation to confiscate guns
So you think you can control the legislation all by yourself ?
Here you say
i really think your quote here points to the crux of the misunderstanding. you imply that if maryland did have a ban, then bf’s point would be relevant. from what i understand, state bans are constitutional. i’m not arguing that guns can’t be banned
It doesn’t make any difference how they get banned. If they get banned that is probably the end.
Everyone except you and maybe a couple of others does not want to give up anything that might lead to that end.
Quote Cal Law
13. Can I inherit and keep a registered assault weapon?
No. Pursuant to California Penal Code section 12285(b), any person who obtains title to a registered assault weapon by bequest or intestate succession shall, within 90 days, render the weapon permanently inoperable, sell the weapon to a licensed gun dealer who has a permit from the Department of Justice to purchase assault weapons, obtain a permit from the Department of Justice to possess assault weapons, or remove the weapon from this state.
Permit?
Where can I get registration forms?
If you are party to a criminal case involving possession of an assault weapon prior to January 1, 2002, and if you qualify to register that assault weapon in order to reduce the offense to an infraction, you may obtain an Assault Weapon Registration Form from the Department of Justice. The form includes instructions.
Explanation
Which assault weapons can and cannot be registered?
The assault weapon registration period has ended. The DOJ is no longer accepting new assault weapon registration forms. The only exception applies to persons who have been arrested for possession of an unregistered assault weapon. Such a person may be eligible, through December 31, 2001, to have the charge reduced to an infraction if he or she meets the specific conditions described in Penal Code section 12280©. One of these conditions requires that the person register the assault weapon with the DOJ. The DOJ will accept a registration from such a person if he or she provides the DOJ with documentation substantiating his or her arrest. However, this option is only available for assault weapons as defined by characteristics that are not Roberti-Roos assault weapons or AK or AR-15 series weapons.
OK Bunky
Whats your point again?