BASE NONSENSE IGNORES REAL JUSTICE PRIORITIES

Let me get this straight.

We need to build more prisons in this country because, despite the
fact that crime has been going down pretty much for the last 20 years
or so, there is a rampant rise in unreported offences?

And, despite a majority of citizens in this country believing
marijuana should be legalized or possession of it decriminalized, we
need to increase penalties for people growing the demon weed?

And, despite their own internal polls showing crime isn't one of the
top priorities of Canadians, it will be one of the centrepieces of
this Conservative government?

And this government that wants to increase penalties for marijuana,
and prostitution for that matter, is claiming a libertarian streak is
behind doing away with the mandatory long-form census?

Is the heat in Ottawa this summer having the same effect on
everyone?

A lot of questions, I know, but it's been hard keeping track lately as
there's been a lot of talk about crime, and drugs, and how this world
ain't what it used to be.

Statistics Canada released its annual crime statistics in July, which
showed that yet again, crime is on the decline in the country.

Hooray! Right?

Wrong.

Crime isn't down apparently.

Ok, mathematically, it's down from 2008 to 2009, just as it had been
from 2007 to 2008, and so on.

The severity of crime is also down.

But those with a stake in a law and order agenda, which isn't
necessarily a bad one, just flawed, have been quick to remind us that
crime is not in fact down.

Compared to 50 years ago, when they started keeping track, our crime
rate is up a whopping million percent.

OK, that may be not be the reality, but trying to compare today with
the '60s ignores the reality of a lot of great progress in the last
two decades making our streets safer.

And ignoring the reality is easy, apparently.

With no stats to back it up at the time, former public safety minister
Stockwell Day, currently head of the treasury board, insisted part of
the reason we needed billions for more prisons in Canada is because
there's a significant increase in unreported crimes.

I don't know if he knows, but for someone to go to jail, people need
to report the crime, a suspect has to be arrested, tried and convicted.

And the offence that isn't being reported has to be serious enough to
warrant jail time, and as stats have shown, offences that serious have
been in decline.

Echoing that mistrust of the stats in a local radio interview was
Calgary police Chief Rick Hanson, even though he was more than happy
to use the drop in the crime rate as proof his boost in boots on the
ground was making a difference.

Heaven knows how cops can at once use stats to prove they're doing a
good job while claiming the stats are unreliable because they don't
paint the whole picture.

But hey, at least the new prisons Day was talking about will go to
use, what with minimum sentences for growing a handful of marijuana
plants or running a flophouse.

Look, I don't want violent criminals, sexual predators or child porn
producers wandering our streets, and if Stock had suggested that he
wanted to fill jails with white-collar crooks and people preying on
our kids, I'd be defending the man.

But this kind of bafflegab is tough to defend.