GRIEF HAS TO BECOME ACTION

The murder of four Mounties near Mayerthorpe this week was an appalling
tragedy that hits you like a physical blow. It also stands as a monumental
rebuke to a self-satisfied nation that prides itself on being the kinder,
gentler corner of North America.

But perhaps it will turn out to be the wake-up call we need, the first step
back from widespread tolerance for law-breaking and for soft sentencing by
the courts that undermines the credibility of the justice system.

Alberta has been arguing for some time that Ottawa needs to toughen up its
approach to marijuana grow-ops, like the one the Mayerthorpe Mounties
stumbled on. It's been on the agenda at several justice ministers'
meetings, most recently in January, but to little effect.

The feds argue that their new legislation to decriminalize marijuana
possession gets tough with grow-ops. In addition to making possession of up
to 15 grams of dope punishable by a simple fine ($150 for adults and $100
for minors), the Liberals' bill proposes that growers caught with more than
three plants would face up to five years in jail, or 18 months plus a
$25,000 fine. More plants would get you a longer jail sentence, up to a
maximum of 14 years for grow-ops with more than 50 plants.

Great, but these are maximum sentences, and the people who would actually
enforce the new law - the provinces and the police - are skeptical that the
courts would impose anything close to the maximum sentence. Liberal MP Dan
McTeague agrees and is pushing the government to impose a minimum of four
years in jail as a deterrent for those involved in this multibillion-dollar
industry.

Giving last week's tragedy a political meaning is a touchy subject. "In the
wake of something like this, you want to give people time to grieve," says
Alberta Justice spokesman Mark Cooper. And he's right.

Yet the almost unprecedented murder of four police officers should
influence the political agenda. Any nation that cares about law enforcement
and the people who take on that task on our behalf, must take a long, hard
look in the mirror after a tragedy like this.

"We've got to do whatever we can to make this province inhospitable for
these activities," says Cooper. "Alberta will continue to advance its
ideas, especially in light of this."

Alberta's view is that the feds' decriminalization bill "sends mixed
messages" about Canada's attitude towards illegal drugs. That belief is
supported by an opinion poll conducted last month that found half of us
believe the government is actually going to make dope-smoking legal.

"We're not in the business of legalizing marijuana," says federal Public
Safety Minister Anne McLellan, who looked shaken to the core by the
Mayerthorpe massacre. But that's precisely what the Alberta wing of the
federal Liberals wants, arguing that such a move "would be a serious blow
to drug dealers and organized crime."

Even my old pal Nick Taylor, former senator and former leader of the
Alberta Liberals, thinks this would be a good idea. "The way we've done it
now, marijuana has become the exclusive prerogative of the criminal element
because there's such a fantastic profit in it," he says. "I'm not
suggesting that the four (Mounties) would be alive if we had legalized
marijuana, but I suspect they might be."

Well, I don't know what Nick's been smoking or why he would believe that
criminals making "fantastic profit" from illegal dope would jump at the
opportunity to make less money from a legal commodity that's taxed and
regulated. It's the same flawed thinking that led the federal Liberals to
believe a gun registry would somehow cut down on the criminal use of firearms.

Tell that to the families of the young Mounties gunned down near
Mayerthorpe. The whole point of criminals is that they don't obey laws,
even laws crafted by well-meaning politicians who think they can legislate
away bad behaviour.

We can expect a huge outpouring of public grief in the wake of this
tragedy, just as happened after the "friendly-fire" incident in
Afghanistan, which took the lives of four Edmonton soldiers. We're Canadian
- - we do empathy well.

But can we connect the dots? Feeling sad is not enough. Canadians felt sad
over the deaths in Afghanistan, but you would be hard-pressed to argue that
it resulted in a major change in public support for the military, which
leaves Ottawa free to continue giving little more than lip service to
national defence. Anne McLellan admitted in the wake of the Mayerthorpe
tragedy that marijuana grow-ops have become "a scourge." So let's treat
them that way. The best epitaph for the four lives lost would be for Ottawa
to put new teeth in the law they died trying to enforce.