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The Ukrainian government has called for foreign volunteers to help them fight the Russians.
Might this be a way for NATO nations to help Ukraine without risking an all-out war with Russia? They could simply “encourage” well-trained “volunteers” to flood into Ukraine…
Russia did more or less the same themselves in the Crimea a few years ago: suddenly large numbers of “little green men,” men in military gear without identification, flooded the peninsula.
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| The mote and the beam. |
Luke 6:41-45
41 Why do you notice the splinter in your brother’s eye, but do not perceive the wooden beam in your own?
42 How can you say to your brother, ‘Brother, let me remove that splinter in your eye,’ when you do not even notice the wooden beam in your own eye? You hypocrite! Remove the wooden beam from your eye first; then you will see clearly to remove the splinter in your brother’s eye.
43 “A good tree does not bear rotten fruit, nor does a rotten tree bear good fruit.
44 For every tree is known by its own fruit. For people do not pick figs from thornbushes, nor do they gather grapes from brambles.
45 A good person out of the store of goodness in his heart produces good, but an evil person out of a store of evil produces evil; for from the fullness of the heart the mouth speaks.”
Today’s gospel reading, from Luke, illuminates familiar passages in Matthew,
First, we have the passage best known in Matthew for the often quoted phrase “judge not, lest ye be judged.”
But here only the words that follow appear: about removing the beam from your own eye before removing the splinter from your brother’s.
This makes it clear that the command is not to judge as such. That was not the message, but rather not to judge others by a harsher standard than you judge yourself—it is against hypocrisy, not against making moral judgements, including of others’ actions.
“Judge not, lest ye be judged” is a phrase conveniently ripped out of context by the wicked to protect themselves from criticism.
The reference to the tree and its fruit—“by their fruits ye shall know them”—here is clarified; it refers not to moral deeds, but to speech.
What counts as evil speech?
Not necessarily evil counsel, for that would not be easily evident. Not lies, for the same reason. Not things that are intentionally evil—the tree does not deliberate over its fruit, and this coming from the heart implies something the evil person cannot hide with any cunning.
I suggest that “evil speech” means ugly speech; that this is an aesthetic judgement. It is speech that “tastes” bad, as a fruit can taste bad or look ugly. Someone who can speak beautifully is a good person; someone who cannot is a bad person.
And for “speech” here, read the arts broadly. “The arts” was not a concept available to Jesus or his listeners in the New Testament. But, as among Arabs today, the essential art among the ancient Jews was the art of fine speech.
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| From the BBC, and two days old at posting. |
Wars rarely end as they begin. Five days in, it is foolish to predict what will happen in Ukraine. Early reports are that Ukraine is holding the Russians back suprisingly well.
This seems significant, however, because the earliest stages of a war favour the aggressor. Think of the Schlieffen Plan. Think of Hitler’s blitzkriegs. Think of Japan’s rapid expansion after Pearl Harbour. The aggressor has the advantage of surprise, and would not attack unless he thought he had the upper hand. Yet so far, this is the best he can do. Ukrainian defense should only get stiffer as time goes on.
Some have said that Putin sent in the B team, and better troops are likely to follow.
But this makes no sense. Russia is not engaged elsewhere. Given that their best opportunity is at the outset, it would be strategically insane not to use your best troops as the initial spearhead.
Putin is also on borrowed time. His regime is not popular at home. Those who rule by fear and strength are quickly vulnerable if they show weakness. Ask the Greek junta, which fell when they unsuccessfully tried to annex Cyprus. Ask the Argentine Junta, which collapsed when they tried to invade the Falklands. Any prolonged war in Ukraine is risky to Putin at home.
Last night, I saw three retired US Generals give the opinion that Putin was now going to fail to take Ukraine.
The third thought that NATO was going to be drawn in.
If Ukraine holds out, pressure is going to increase on the West to come more aggressively to their aid. They cannot afford the blowback among their own people, or in world opinion, if they just stand by and watch while a gallant Ukraine is slowly and bloodily beaten down. And they cannot pass up the strategic opportunity, if Ukraine is doing the heavy lifting, and an intervention would tip the balance. Compare Spain, France, and Holland intervening in the American Revolution.
This might mean World War III. Especially if this was prearranged with China, who will land the second blow by invading Taiwan in the spring. But it is more likely as things look now to mean the collapse of the Putin government. Scaring China off their plans for Taiwan. Sweden, Finland, and Ukraine then join NATO. Russia perhaps goes pro-West and more truly democratic. The governments of Belarus and Kazakhstan probably also soon fall, without Russian muscle to defend them against their own people.
Should all this happen, might the repercussions also be felt in China? Not just the decision not to invade Taiwan this season; Xi, and his aggressive foreign policy stance, might fall.
The smells in the winds of freedom are heady, as we saw in the Arab Spring, orin the fall of the Berlin Wall.
Might they even be felt in Canada?
Xerxes makes the point that only those who experience prejudice know when it happens. The prejudiced will have no idea. And he adds that he is being discriminated against by the truckers who went to Ottawa.
He is wrong to say that only the victim of prejudice can recognize it. Prejudice is a thought. We cannot read minds. Therefore, only the perpetrator knows.
The perpetrator may not believe he is prejudiced, true. Prejudice is a logical fallacy; people make logical errors all the time.
But so do the supposed victims. Hans Christian Andersen illustrates the problem in his parable of The Princess and the Pea. The privileged, if they face the slightest hardship, will think it a grave injustice, and raise a loud lament. Those who are often discriminated against are likely to have become conditioned to their lot, or rarely dare complain.
Accordingly, we cannot accept the judgement of the person claiming to have experienced prejudice. We need clear evidence.
We see a good example in the recent Freedom Convoy. The judge in the bail hearings for either Tamara Lich or Pat King referred to the honking of truck horns as “torture,” justifying a criminal charge, denial of bail, and perhaps even the declaration of a national emergency. I have heard complaints about diesel fumes.
The comfortable judge and the other complainers do not realize that the sound of truck horns and the smell of diesel is daily life to the truckers. A mine or a typical factory floor is also smelly and noisy. If their work experience is indeed torture, they surely do have something to complain about. QED.
Conversely, the truckers may have had no idea honking or diesel fumes would be torture to folks in downtown Ottawa.
Who, it must be said, are the most privileged among us.
One thing Canada should do to help the Ukrainians is to immediately open the doors to Ukrainian refugees.
Many are saying that the Ukraine is not our problem; that Canada should stay out.
Unfortunately, it is our problem. To stay out is the stance of the evil weak, allowing the woman to be raped in the stairwell, so long as she is a stranger.
Collective security protects us all; its failure is a threat to us all.
What is happening is unambiguous. Russia has invaded a neighbouring country. Even Russia is not pretending otherwise.
Canada can do little by itself, and perhaps little in combination with others, but we are obliged to do what we sensibly can.
To my eyes, the conflict between the Freedom Convoy and the Canadian government is as clear an example as possible, in this fallen world, of a fight of good against evil.
And the way it has apparently ended is a moral lesson: in the short term, evil always wins.
This is because, unlike good, evil will pursue self-interest without restraints. In particular, the greatest power of evil is the lie.
The lie can trick a large number of good people to support evil, because it is difficult for good people to believe others are lying. You can always cheat an honest man. These are the gullible good.
Others, many others, go along because it is easier to keep your head down—and the evil are invariably in power. “I’m all right, Jack!” These are the weak evil.
Because of this overall dynamic, the powers and principalities of this world are generally going to be evil. Any student of history must see this to be true. Except in exceptional times, the wicked rise to the top. The Bible, clearly enough, tells us so. The good are the salt under their feet.
On the other hand, the powers of this world suffer from the limits of the lie. This is why the arc of history indeed bends toward justice. Caught in a lie, like the Boy Who Cried Wolf, it all comes down about their ears. The previously deluded good people wake up, and with the heroic good, they form a majority. Once they are aroused and look unstoppable, the cowardly bad will swing behind them, and the house of cards comes down.
That, I suspect, is what the Freedom Convoy will have accomplished in the longer term. It was not strong enough yet. But by remaining resolutely peaceful, they have seized the moral high ground, and good people are going to wake up to who has been lying.
This is the strategy of Martin Luther King, of Gandhi, of Daniel O’Connell. Or of the early Christians.
The dawn is near.
Sadly, however, we are still in this fallen world. Trudeau may go soon, the Liberal Party may fall, and the heritage media may fade away. But soon enough, a new gang of bad people, piggybacking on the prestige hard-earned by the heroic truckers, will muscle to the front.
I think Pat King is already an example.
So now we have a big war.
American and NATO cannot afford to do too much. It is only too likely, if they get heavily committed in Ukraine, that China will seize the opportunity to take Taiwan. Indeed, I suspect this may be the plan, organized jointly by Russia and China.
But if NATO does too little, its reliability as an ally will be badly tarnished.
Sanctions have never worked to deter Russia before. Short of committing troops on the ground, can NATO do much else?
Perhaps something in the realm of cyberwar. I do not know how good Western capabilities are. The bad news is that Russia certainly has capabilities here too.
Other thoughts:
1. Rush small arms to the Ukraine in huge numbers. Get guns, grenades, and ammunition in the hands of as many Ukrainians as possible. Set Russia up for a long guerilla war. Ukrainians have a history of doing this.
2. Offer immediate NATO membership to Moldova and rush in NATO troops. This will at least punish Russia for the invasion, and have symbolic value.
3. In strictly military terms, it would not be costly to blockade and even seize the Kaliningrad area of Russia, which is surrounded by NATO countries. NATO troops are already in the area. This could probably done fast enough to be a fait accompli before Russia could react. It could be held as a trade-off for Russia vacating Ukraine.
Of course, invading part of Russia risks world war. But Putin is risking world war already. We have a game of chicken here. If it is always Russia escalating, and the West de-escalating, Russia always wins.
4. Close the Dardanelles to Russian shipping. Because the strait is so narrow, it would take very little to do so. Turkey is a NATO member.
5. Close the Baltic to Russian shipping. Again, it would take little to do so from Denmark, another NATO member.
6. Close the Sea of Japan to Russian shipping. This would be harder, but there are pinch points at Pusan-Fukuoka and Hokkaido. The combined Japanese, South Korean, and US Navies might manage it while being close enough to swiftly redeploy to Taiwan if necessary.
7. Invade Syria and take out Russia’s Assad client regime. Tit for tat—they invade a Western ally, the West invades their ally. They pull out of Ukraine, the West pulls out of Syria. The West is pretty sick of Middle Eastern wars, but it would not need that much redeployment to take out Syria, from Turkey, Israel, and Iraq.
One serious complicating factor is European dependence on Russian oil. I don’t know how big a problem that would be. Maybe prohibitive.
The timing of Trudeau’s announced cancellation of the Emergency Act suggests the main reason was that it was about to get voted down in the Senate.
The harm caused to the banking system might have been handled by simply eschewing this power and freeing all seized accounts. Reputedly, this was already happening.
But Trudeau’s announcement happened in the middle of the Senate debate, before the vote. It seems about the time it should have been clear to an inside observer how the vote was about to go.
Had the Senate voted down the measure, Trudeau would have been in a tough situation. He had called it a confidence vote in the Commons—lose the vote, and he would be obliged to resign. There is no such thing as a confidence vote in the Senate, but saying it is a confidence vote is saying the government does not believe it can govern without it. Therefore, there would be calls for Trudeau to resign, and it would look irregular if he did not; perhaps it would even become a constitutional crisis.
It would also support the argument that Trudeau’s actions up to that point were improper, if not illegal.
So pulling the Act may have dodged him a bullet.
Does all this harm Trudeau politically? It looks as though it won’t. I have seen the argument that, by withdrawing the Act so soon, Trudeau counters claims that he was power-hungry or overreacting. Since it never got to the vote in the Senate, people may never know if this was the real reason.
Dear Senator Yussuff:
This is to urge you to help vote down the government’s invocation of the Emergency Act. It is not necessary to protect the sovereignty or constitutional government of Canada against so far peaceful protests, and the precedent set now will be crippling if not fatal to Canadian democracy. If any future government can declare a state of emergency on a relatively trivial matter, and seize bank accounts and assets without recourse, no organized opposition to government can any longer form.
This could also be true of labour actions. The Emergency Act is in particular a betrayal of the working class.
The Senate is our last best hope to prevent this. Please demonstrate the relevance of the Senate as a chamber of sober second thought. I am sure history will remember you well for it.
Sincerely
Stephen K. Roney
Trudeau just backed down.
Film at eleven.
I wonder: is this because he had inside knowledge he was about to lose the vote in the Senate?
Or might it have been a reaction to the awful press, especially internationally?
Or--quite likely--was it the banks raising the alarm at how he was destroying their credibility and their business.
This was politics at its worst. He was trying to play both sides of the issue, to cover his own posterior portions.
He says he speaks “in the interest of disappointing everyone in my audience.” This is a politician talking. He is doing the exact opposite—trying to avoid alienating anyone.
C.S. Lewis noted that the essential virtue is courage. Because when the test comes, doing the right thing always takes courage. Doing the right thing only when it is easy is not morality.
Erskine-Smith knows he is doing the wrong thing, and seeks to justify himself.
“Some Conservative colleagues have made the case that we could have ended the illegal blockades if only we ended federal vaccine mandates. A Neville Chamberlain approach to pandemic management.”
This begins by comparing concerned fellow Canadians to Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Not a good start.
It makes a difference that Hitler’s claims on Czechoslovakia were not legitimate.
Erskine-Smith neglects to consider whether the government policy of requiring vaccine mandates of truckers crossing the border, was an egregious violation of human rights, and/or unnecessary. He refuses to acknowledge that the protesters might have had a case to make.
More generally, is it wrong for government to bend to the will of a noisy minority?
Certainly, if they are right, certainly. An honourable and responsible government can admit error. Would Erskine-Smith have refused to ratify the US Civil Rights Act of 1964, because it meant giving in to such noisy protests by a minority? How abnout protests by Canada’s First Nations? Does that mean government must not change any of its Indian policies?
What should a government do if the protesters are simply wrong? Wrong about everything? For otherwise, compromise is possible.
A responsible government should then address the protesters, and explain why they cannot do as they wish. Then, so long as the protest is peaceful, they should let it continue. At worst, it will let off steam.
The government will protest that the demonstrators were shutting down businesses. They even want to sue the protesters on these grounds. This is profoundly dishonest. There was a street festival in downtown Ottawa; people were flocking from all over. The business opportunities were better than Winterfest. The protesters were demanding businesses reopen, and commerce resume. The government required then to shut down.
“we should proceed cautiously as we lift measures that have helped to save lives.”
This is a red herring. The evidence is unclear on whether the lockdowns or mandates have saved lives, or cost lives. Other jurisdictions have seen fit to raise all restrictions. The truckers were not making an unreasonable demand.
“everyone has the right to peaceful protest. But that right does not extend to blocking highways and bridges. It doesn’t extend to the intimidation, harassment, threats, and the endless and deafening noise we’ve seen in our national capital.”
Erskine-Smith would have a point if the protesters were blocking important highways or bridges. They were not. The Ambassador Bridge was a separate protest, and had already been cleared.
If some Ottawa protesters were guilty of intimidation, harassment, or threats, Erskine-Smith has an obligation to present the evidence. Many reports have it that the demonstration was a model of peaceful protest. There were cameras everywhere throughout: if there were any egregious examples of intimidation, harassment, or threats, we have a right to see them.
If there were isolated incidents, blaming the protest or “the protesters” for this is the fallacy of hasty generalization, or prejudice. This is the root of racism.
“The endless and deafening noise” no doubt refers to truckers honking their horns. Protests are always noisy. That is the whole point: to be heard. What is excessive must be a matter of opinion. The few people living near Wellington Street may have found truck horns too loud. This may not have seemed to to truckers, accustomed to them. Or the working class: try the noise level in a mine, or on a factory floor.
In any event, an injunction against honking was sought, and granted, and I hear generally observed. Any trucker sounding his horn could have been prosecuted.
The claim that truckers were sounding their horns at every hour of the day or night is certainly false: truckers need to sleep too.
Some locals were reputedly complaining of diesel fumes. Eeek! Welcome to the world of the working classes.
“These are crimes and they are quite obviously crimes.”
He has to say this precisely because they are not obviously crimes. The organizer of the protest, Tamara Lich, has been charged with ”inciting mischief.” This is a vague and subjective charge. It remains to be seen whether it will hold up in court.
“We can’t paint every protester with the same brush. But we can judge people by the company they keep.”
Erskine-Smith is painting every protester with the same brush, and trying to get away with it by claiming he is not doing it. Typical politician-speak.
When we are speaking of a crowd at a protest, this is obviously not true. Nobody has any control over who else is there.
This is an unsubtle example of guilt by association.
“we should never platform the language of treason, medical experiments, the Nuremberg Code, or support for white supremacy – all of which we saw on our democracy’s doorstep.”
These claims are oddly vague; probably because clarity would reveal their falsity. He means, I think, charges that the government is treasonous, is conducting medical experiments, is in violation of the Nuremberg Code. But he surely does not mean the government supports white supremacy. Lumping them together like this seems to be to give the impression that it is the protesters doing these things, not the government.
Either way, I have not seen any obvious examples of this, having watched many live streams and videos of the protesters. It is as though Erskine-Smith fears being accused of this, rather than that the protesters are doing this.
But even if such charges were there, they are covered by the right to free speech, guaranteed in our constitution. In a free democracy, one may accuse the government of treason, medical experiments, or being in violation of the Nuremberg Code. To “deplatform” such speech, to silence it, is totalitarian.
“Encouraging lawlessness and emboldening anti-government, anti-democratic voices does a disservice to our country”
Erskine-Smith is begging the question. The protesters were claiming that the government is acting unlawfully, violating the constitution; that is the essence of their complaint. They believed they were acting within the law, and took pains to remain within the law.
On the other hand, invoking the Emergency Act is a perfect example of acting lawlessly. It suspends the laws.
Being “anti-government” is not relevant. The Conservative Party or the NDP are also “anti-government.” Having the right to be anti-government is the essence of a free society.
It is true that any protest against a democratically elected government is “anti-democratic.” But the Charter of Rights and Freedoms is also anti-democratic. Democracy can easily become dictatorship of the majority. That is what happened in Nazi Germany. We therefore have protections for minorities. One is the right to peaceful protest.
“no matter how much hatred you have for your opponents.”
This is tasteless. The government has declared the protesters “mad,” “a fringe minority,” “Nazis,” “racists,” “white supremacists,” “Islamophobic,” misogynist,” “homophobic,” “insurrectionists,” “taking up space,” “unacceptable,” and so on. By comparison, what division have the protesters fostered? Or the Conservative Party?
This is the “I know you are, but what am I?” school of political debate. You may remember it from the Grade Three schoolyard.
“The failure to enforce the law in Ottawa, the acquiescence to occupation, emboldened similar blockades across the country.”
This works only if the concerns of the protesters were frivolous. Erskine-Smith has not established this. If they are serious, this is going to have the opposite effect. Silencing people who feel they are not being listened to is not a solution, but a way of escalating tensions.
When the authorities threatened to shut down the Ottawa protest, I predicted the Ambassador Bridge protest on this basis. It was “Whack-a-mole.” Now, as soon as the Canadian protests are suppressed, we have a larger convoy forming in the US. Who knows what longer-range dire consequences we will see in Canada? Probably a Western separatist movement; certainly deeper social divisions; hopefully not violence in the streets.
Erskine-Smith knows this. I pointed it out to him, citing historical examples. He is in denial, or just consciously lying.
Calling the Ottawa protest an “occupation” is also prejudicial language, “poisoning the well.” It was not, by dictionary definition.
“The specific section requires there be ‘activities in support of the threat or use of acts of serious violence against persons or property for the purpose of achieving a political, religious or ideological objective."
It’s obvious enough that the latter element is met, as warped as the ideological objectives may be.”
Erskine-Smith again simply asserts this for the good reason that he has no argument; it is not true. The protests were, many observers attest, a model or peaceful protest. There were no injuries. There was no property damage.
Of course the protesters had a political aim. In a free and democratic society, everyone does.
“We know that dangerous and extremist elements are embedded within these protests and blockades. In Coutts, for example, we saw conspiracy to commit murder charges, with two of the accused connected to a far-right extremist group. We also saw the police seize a cache of guns and body armour.”
We do not know this. The guns seized in Coutts were not found in the convoy. Their true significance awaits court proceedings. The Coutts blockade itself was not connected with the Ottawa group. It disbanded peacefully.
Some guns allegedly found in a farmhouse in Southern Alberta do not justify conclusions on something happening on the other side of the country. To suggest it does looks paranoid. Someone is not rational here. Is the obvious remedy to give them unlimited power?
“In Ottawa, we saw major intimidation of local residents, and threats against the police if they enforced the law.”
Here again, Erskine-Smith needed to specify what he means and give examples. Then we can decide whether his claims are credible. There were cameras and smartphones everywhere. If any of this happened, on any large scale, he and the government should have lots of evidence to show the public. So far, I have seen nothing. “Threats against the [heavily armed] police” by unarmed demonstrators, even if they happened, do not sound serious.
“the government has not clearly articulated which ground it relies on here.”
This is as much as to admit that invoking the Emergency Act is illegal.
The Charter of Rights “guarantees the rights and freedoms set out in it subject only to such reasonable limits prescribed by law as can be demonstrably justified in a free and democratic society.” To impose the Emergency Act, the government must demonstrate that it is justified. Erskine-Smith points out that they have not done so. They are simply saying “trust us.”
“When we look at the illegal blockades, and the negative impact they wrought on so many lives, there’s a fair argument that they meet the definition of a national emergency, so long as we understand capacity to mean both whether a province could act in theory as well as the reality of their action.”
“Capacity” means ability, not will. Erskine-Smith’s definition is illegitimate.
Not to mention, there are no ongoing blockades. No emergency. The provinces cleared them—demonstrating both the capacity and the will.
The case against the Emergency Act could not be clearer.
Erskine-Smith goes on to cite the supposed need for new laws to deal with “crowdfunding for illegal domestic activities.” If so, this is not done by invoking the Emergency Act. But, as Viva Frei (David Freiheit) points out, Freedom Convoy 2022 was registered with the federal government as a non-profit to collect funds on GoFundMe. It is dishonest to claim now that the funding was for “illegal activities.” The federal government certified that it was not.
Erskine-Smith has as much as said that the Emergency Act is illegal. And he has said he will vote for it anyway. Because nothing matters so much as his political future.
It looks as though the Canadian government is backing down on freezing people’s bank accounts. Although different official sources are saying opposite things. As if our government is in chaos.
Not surprising: freezing people’s bank accounts is and will be devastating to Canadian and international confidence in the Canadian banking system. With serious long-term economic conseque3nces.
Was our government so incompetent they apparently did not realize this? Were they so hysterical they did not care?
From Natural Selections:
Atrocities don’t start with the visibly atrocious. If they started with what was visible and horrible, people wouldn’t let them happen. If they began in an obvious way, they would not, by and large, result in atrocities. No, all too often, atrocity starts by offering treats to some part of the population. People who receive the treats are grateful for them, because who doesn’t like treats? People thus sated can then more easily ignore the fact that not everyone is getting treats.
Then, once the asymmetrical distribution of treats begins, it is easier to maintain the asymmetry by blaming those who don’t receive treats. Those people don’t deserve treats. Those people are dirty. They are sources of disease. They are non-compliant. They are, in the end, the other. They are not us. If they were us, they too would get treats. Ipso facto.
Passing on a suggestion by Maxime Bernier that Canadians write a senator urging they oppose the invocation of the Emergency Act.
Find a senator from your province here:
https://sencanada.ca/en/senators
I think there is a real chance this will work.
I believe MPs and Senators take letters from constituents seriously. It is their window on public sentiment, and they generally believe they are there to represent their constituents.
In the Commons, Trudeau was able to declare the vote a matter of confidence, and force members of the NDP and Liberal parties to vote the party line or face a quick election in which they would not be allowed to run--in other words, lose their jobs and income.
This does not apply to the Senate. They are appointed, and cannot be threatened in this way. Officially, there is not even a Liberal caucus; they are supposed to be independent. They should be able to vote their conscience, their constituents, and their best judgement.
I suspect there is also an incentive for them to vote the measure down. The Senate's relevance is often questioned. This would help allay those doubts.
So if you are Canadian, gentle reader, by all means give it a go.
https://sencanada.ca/en/senators
Among the already visible or likely consequences of Justin Trudeau’s handling of the Freedom Convoy are likely to be
A destruction of the historic Canadian respect for the police. This will cost us a lot of money and a lot of strife from now on.
A lack of trust in the banking system: the Canadian banking system used to be one of the most solid in the world, surviving the 2008 crash barely scathed. An unstable banking system will be a serious drag on the economy and on foreign investment.
A serious tarnishing of our reputation abroad, and of our ability to speak on the world stage.
Very likely a major boost to Western separatist movements. Possibly a boost to Quebec separatism as well.
A crippling of democracy. If opposition voices must fear having their assets seized, no opposition can organize.
Trudeau is also deliberately fomenting strife among ethnic groups.
A general disrespect for the rule of law. As Confucius pointed out, if the government itself does not follow the law, the people cannot be made to.
A general distrust of the media. With no neutral voices, nobody knows any longer whom to trust.
Continuing damage to the economy and the livelihoods of Canadians by persisting in the lockdowns and mandates. Trudeau is retaining them when other countries, and some provinces, are dropping them. He seems to be doing this out of spite.
The immense public expense of suppressing the protest, which might have been dispersed at no cost, and much sooner, by negotiation and compromise.
Just the guy we want to give virtually unlimited power, right?
What am I missing?
This clip illustrates the fact that a large proportion of the population, especially the elite, are insane.
A large portion of the population, and of the elite, actually see common working people as foreign and dangerous. Their views are “unacceptable,” and must not be heard, whatever they might turn out to be.
This explains their horror of “populism.” This explains Trump Derangement Syndrome. This explains why they see ordinary Canadians as being in “occupation” of their own capital. That term refers to a foreign military power. This is why they consider a series of parking violations a national emergency threatening the country itself.
I realize it is not some conspiracy against the public—it is not as rational as that. They are terrified. They are hysterical, and are acting hysterically. They are paranoid. Otherwise they would not be so vindictive, so obviously emotional about matters.
Paranoia is caused by a guilty conscience. They know they have been getting away with some grave crime, and fear a reckoning.
The reckoning will come.
If it does not come from without, it will come from within. We are almost already seeing it. Their own conscience will ultimately require it. Dostoyevsky laid out the mechanics in Crime and Punishment. But they may cause much suffering on the way down. We have seen genocides.
Paranoia, and a guilty conscience, generally obliges the guilty party to reveal their fear of their own sin by projecting it on others.
Chillingly, the elite sees themselves as comparable to Hitler.
The position of the NDP on the Emergency Act does not make sense. Not just that it is founded the lie that the convoy has called for the overthrow of the government, and the lie that is was violet. But it also does not seem to make political sense. They keep saying that the Emergency Act is made necessary by a failure of leadership. But if there has been such a failure of leadership, it obviously makes no sense to give the same leader more powers.
Why identify themselves with a failing Prime Minister?
The Emergency Act may be popular at the moment, but anyone who knows history can predict that it is going to become a lot less popular soon. The more so as the protesters have remained peaceful, and the government has acted harshly.
And they are turning against the working class. Not just that the truckers are working class, and express widespread working class sentiments. Declaring the Emergency Act against a peaceful protest or even a peaceful blockade sets a bad precedent for union action in the future.
For many years, the NDP has not been the party of the working class, but of petty government officials—teachers, especially. But some of their members do represent working class ridings, and they stand to lose them at the next election.
They also reduce their profile as an alternative to the Liberals, when they were already having some trouble making the distinction. Why vote for the NDP, who have no chance of power, if their platform is too like that of the Liberals, who do have a chance at power?
The obvious explanation is that the government has declared this a confidence vote. If it goes down, they will try to call an election. The NDP does not have the funds to fight an election.
I feel there is also an element of paranoia, in the NDP and in the Liberals. They fear the working class. This comes with a guilty conscience.
I believe the government cannot whip the Senate. They need not fear an election, and there is no official Liberal caucus. Senators should be free to vote their conscience. It may appeal to many to rise to the occasion and justify the Senate’s existence.
This is troubling. An MP rises in the Commons to ask how many members of Cabinet are supporters of the World Economic Forum, and the Speaker refuses to let him finish the question on the grounds that there is something wrong with the sound quality.
Even if this were true--we can hear the question clearly--he does not then allow the speaker to repeat the question.
It's hard not to believe in a conspiracy at this point.
I was unpleasantly surprised to see Justin Trudeau, at a press conference this morning, not say he was going to withdraw the Emergency Act. It is obviously no longer necessary, and it has obviously already been abused.
If it goes through, I fear the only way to restore faith in Canadian democracy and Canadian institutions is to remove Trudeau from office as quickly as possible. This will be a job for the Liberal caucus, or, failing that, the House, through a no confidence motion. Ordinarily, one should go no further; if former leaders are prosecuted, this becomes an incentive to try to seize power instead of leaving office when voted out. However, some step must be taken to ensure that the Emergency Act is never used capriciously again, or abused in the course of its use.
Perhaps Parliament could swiftly pass a new law making improperly evoking or using the Emergency Act itself a criminal offense—the offense of tyranny.
It must be clear that the government cannot seize or freeze assets in the absence of a specific crime, and never without a court order. With penalties for doing so.
It should also be made illegal to employ police without visible identification—numbered badge and, ideally, face visible. Otherwise it becomes impossible for the public to hold individuals to account, freeing them to abuse power. Without such ID, gangs or insurgents can pretend to be police. And the public has a right to suspect the government is employing foreign mercenaries or foreign troops.
If the NDP supports the Emergency Act, Jagmeet Singh should also be removed from his position. But this can only be done by the NDP itself. If they do not, they will no doubt pay the price at next election.
I do not say that any of this will happen—only that if it does not, Canadian democracy and civil peace is doomed.
I think the call for a nationwide strike is a tactical error. They should have waited a few days, to see if the Emergency Act is voted down, and they should have limited it to Ottawa. They risk justifying the Emergency Act, in the minds of some, and alienating the public.
The government keeps calling the Freedom Convoy an “illegal occupation.” As noted here previously, it is not an occupation by dictionary definition. That is just incendiary language.
It is also not obviously illegal. Peaceful protest is a human right, recognized under the Charter. In clearing out the protesters, it is the police who seem to be acting illegally.
The protest leader, Tamara Leich, has apparently been arrested and charged with “mischief.”
Mischief; from the Criminal Code:
430 (1) Every one commits mischief who wilfully
(a) destroys or damages property;
(b) renders property dangerous, useless, inoperative or ineffective;
(c) obstructs, interrupts or interferes with the lawful use, enjoyment or operation of property; or
(d) obstructs, interrupts or interferes with any person in the lawful use, enjoyment or operation of property.
No property was damaged, so far as we know, by the protesters, and almost certainly not by Tamara Leich personally.
Did the protests render any property inoperative? No—businesses closed down, but at the insistence of government. Protesters would probably have been happy to patronize any that stayed open, and they would have done booming business.
They did not seem to obstruct anyone from the operation or enjoyment of their property either. Nobody was stopped from entering or exiting the protest area; until the police did this. Perhaps they had more difficulty than usual getting to their property, but this seems marginal. A lane was left open for traffic. Parliament, at the epicentre of the protest, was able to function as normal.
Unless she faces a kangaroo court, it seems to me Leich cannot be convicted.
Ordinary protesters who have been ”arrested” by the police, I hear, have simply been driven out to some remote area and released. Because they cannot be charged—they have committed no crime. This being so, the police may be liable for assault and false arrest.
Canada has been declared to be in a State of Emergency, and all of our human rights suspended, over parking violations.
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| Sodom and Gomorrah |
For what it is worth, I think I see a change in tone among the resolutely leftist commentators on my friend Xerxes’s trucker column, since last week. They sound, on the whole less hateful and dismissive than a week ago. Even if they are not listening, they are suddenly awakening to the need to listen. This suggests that the Freedom convoy may have achieved its aim.
Xerxes himself meditates on the need for truth, and laments that these days few people seem to want truth.
This is postmodernism, which holds that there is no truth, and we are all free to construct our own “narratives.” Postmodernism itself has deeper roots, of course, in the rejection of God.
It is the ideology of the modern left.
It sounds as though Xerxes and his correspondents now accept that there is a truth to be known. I suspect they were blindsided by the truckers, and are now puzzling things out.
They cannot accept the right of the truckers to “speak their own truth,” perhaps, since it is so different from the one they want. But once, in order to resist this, they begin to speak of THE truth, the game is probably up. They are at the table.
One writes:
“I am horrified at the radical right-wing opinions suddenly being spouted by old friends who always seemed to be much more balanced in their views. People are changing their ‘Canadian Values’ in favour of Trump-style ‘Freedom’”
Any objective observer could tell her—and surveys have shown—that the right has not become more radical in recent years. “Radical right” is almost a contradiction in terms. It is the left that has rapidly changed positions. As a postmodernist, she has a pre-Copernican view of the moral universe: she imagines herself as the fixed point.
An immediate example is her declaration that freedom is not a Canadian value. That idea popped up, on the left, more or less yesterday.
Another respondent writes: “I found it interesting to read one comment that we are or will be experiencing an authoritarian government. For a real authoritarian jolt, try living in some other countries of our world.”
Ironic. He should try that himself. He is living in his preconceptions, without testing them. Does he know no immigrants? Had he listened to the truckers, he would have found that many of them are immigrants from Eastern Europe, sounding their alarm that what is happening in Canada now reminds them of the lands they fled.
I have lived in several countries, including Saudi Arabia or Duterte’s Philippines. They are claimed by the Canadian media and the Canadian left to be repressive. And they are. But, apart from certain generally understood land mines, the average person in either country is freer to live their life as they see fit and less vulnerable to arbitrary government action than the average Canadian. The biggest difference is in freedom of speech—it is almost altogether lacking in Canada. The only country I have found less free than Canada is Communist China. Although, granted, I have not lived in New Zealand or Australia.
Another blinkered leftist writes: “This protest is being directed/funded by people who hate our ‘socialist’ system of government.” He has apparently not listened to the truckers’ demands; he is dealing only with his preconceptions. They want an end to mandates. They seem to go out of their way to celebrate the Canadian system of government, waving flags, singing the national anthem, and citing the Charter of Rights and Freedoms as if it was meant to be honoured.
Ironic that this writer ends his comment with the words “People only want to see/hear what they want to, not the truth.“ But it admits that there is such a thing. This is a breakthrough.
A last writer assures us that the Bible reveals to us a Creator “who preaches love and respect of your fellow man and respect for our resources.” If we keep on wasting our resources, He will “send us a message to sit up and take notice of our wicked ways.” So the current pandemic and the political turmoil, she suspects, is the voice of God, and we have been doing something wrong.
Unfortunately, she has not gotten any further than that. She apparently has not read the Bible—the obvious message from said Creator. There is nothing there about respect for resources. That’s an issue that popped up in the 1960s.
The God of the Bible sends his plagues of wrath over things like enslaving people (hence the plagues he sent on Egypt), indiscriminate sex (the reason for sending the Flood), slaughtering your children (the reason he dispossessed the Canaanites), and homosexual rape (why he sent fire on the Cities of the Plain).
There is no doubt a message for us all there. But it has not yet gotten through to her. She imagines God is enraged about us using too much tap water, or not recycling plastic straws.
Still, there is less hate and less intolerance than a week ago. Gears are beginning to turn. The future may be brighter.
Jason Kenney has announced that Alberta will challenge the federal Emergency Act in court. I think this can potentially go straight to the Supreme Court and stop it in its tracks.
If the federal parliament is foolish enough to authorize it.
I think the protesters, by remaining peaceful to the end, have probably won.
The fact that Justin Trudeau and his government want emergency powers in the absence of any real emergency is the surest evidence that they would not use such emergency powers responsibly. The last thing you want to do for anyone who craves power for its own sake is to give them more power. Such cravings are never satisfied. More power will be used to seize more power.
This “emergency” looks like the Reichstag fire. Hitler buffaloed the Reichstag deputies and the public into believing the danger was insurrectionist Communists. This distracted them from the more obvious danger from the sitting Chancellor. They thought, in the end, they could control him, and so surrendered any means to control him. Trudeau has similarly invented a plot by “white supremacists” “waving Nazi flags” to distract from his power grab. Even the guns supposedly found in a farm house near Coutts may be a government plant, as we now believe the Reichstag fire was.
Whether or not this is so, Trudeau has done everything at every step to provoke chaos and to inflame. Beginning with the pointless and unnecessarily provocative vaccine mandate for cross-border truckers—at the very time we were facing a supply-chain crisis, and at the very time other countries were ending all mandates. Insulting the truckers and loudly refusing to recognize their views as legitimate. Threatening their children and their pets. Most recently with having the police go in and break up the peaceful demonstration forcefully. It is as though he and his government have been hoping all along to provoke some violence.
It would be sheer recklessness for the Commons to vote him additional powers, based on this record.
Yet sadly, it has all happened before, following what looks like the very same playbook. In the Weimar Republic. We evidently cannot count on our political class to have the wisdom to stand against this.
Our hope may be the United States. They still have some time not to follow us down this road. In their midterm elections they may pull back from the same precipice, perhaps in part thanks to the Canadian example. Perhaps thanks to the existence of Donald Trump, who begins to look like a Churchillian figure. The Americans would then be in position, if necessary, to restore freedom in Canada; or, at least, be a home for Canadian refugees fearing the actions of their government.
The Daily Mail reports on the guns seized by the RCMP in Coutts.
The woman charged, a local substitute teacher, insists they are not hers, and thinks they were planted by the Mounties.
The inevitable move from libertine and relativist Weimar Republic to Fascist totalitarian state has commenced in Canada. A large portion of the population, probably a majority, support this. It was the same in Germany.
Police horses trampled two protesters, at least one woman. A walker is visible. Rumours are flying Did someone die, or did they "get up and walk away"? Even if the latter, looks terrible.
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| Daniel O'Connell, the man who invented the modern concept of non-violent resistance. |
Whether or not the government clears out all or most of the trucker protest in Ottawa by Monday, their precipitate action suggests they do not have the votes to pass the Emergency Act. If they did before, they are less likely to now: if the convoy is all or mostly cleared out, the claim of an emergency gets weaker: where? And any scenes of violence by the police will make it politically more difficult for MPs or Senators to support it.
Now let’s say the protestors are driven out.
As I have noted, this is not significant, since they are mobile. The problem may be solved only long enough to kill the Emergency Act.
Why wouldn’t the truckers, even spontaneously, take a leaf from Daniel O’Connell’s playbook, and subvert the government dictat through excessive obedience?
The government does not want them in Ottawa. They are not allowed to come to Ottawa. Very well. They will not come to Ottawa.
Why wouldn’t truckers now refuse to take deliveries for Ottawa?
Blockade? They are not preventing anyone else from delivering to Ottawa, are they?
An unseemly image of police shoving an elderly veteran down into the snow.
If this gets much nastier, I fear for the protesters, their kids, their pets, but the government will have made a fatal mistake.
Public sympathy is likely to wheel strongly to the protesters and their cause.
This is a truth the Catholic Church has known roughly since the Resurrection.
"The blood of martyrs."
The government is obviously moving to clear the Ottawa protest today.
I wonder if the plan is to present Parliament with a fait accompli before they get a chance to vote down the emergency powers? Perhaps the PM believes that he does not have the votes in the House or Senate to put it through, so he has only a brief window.
It looks like it. Otherwise, what is the rush to do something so unseemly as to take decisive action before the Emergency Act is passed? It is not as though the protesters were going anywhere.
At the same time, if the Ottawa protest is cleared out before the House votes, it will be that much harder to convince anyone that there is an emergency that still needs to be dealt with. So presumably now it will be voted down in any case. Which surely the government would not have wanted to risk if they had the votes.
I wonder—does the government face repercussions for having acted before being given authority? If the Emergency Act is not passed, are they liable for actions they took this week that violated the law and the charter? Will there be a commission, or any independent review?
I do not know. I assume not, or they would not have acted. If so, it is an obvious flaw in the Act.
I turned away from the Liberal Party and voted for several elections for the NDP because in 1970, the NDP was the only federal party that voted against the War Measures Act. I was shocked at the time that the Conservatives did nothing to protect our civil liberties. They just joined in the herd.
It is consoling to know that Robert Stanfield admitted later that it had been a grave mistake.
Let's pray and hope the Canadian Parliament does not make a graver mistake now.
A note: Pat King is not one of the organizers of the convoy. He's clearly a bit of a nut. Some suspect he is a government plant.
It annoys me to so regularly hear the protest in Ottawa called an “illegal occupation”; and it annoys me that this is so rarely challenged.
This is not an occupation. It is a peaceful, and as I understand it, therefore legal, protest.
Merriam-Webster defines occupation as:
a: the act or process of taking possession of a place or area : SEIZURE
“Spain's occupation of the island.”
b: the holding and control of an area by a foreign military force
“the Roman occupation of Britain”
c: the military force occupying a country or the policies carried out by it
“The occupation addressed the concerns of the local population.”
None of these apply. The truckers are not claiming possession of Wellington Street. They are merely parking there.
They are ordinary Canadians, not a foreign military force. It is their capital.
Oxford defines occupation as:
2. The action, state, or period of occupying or being occupied by military force.
“The Roman occupation of Britain”
2.1The action of entering and taking control of a building.
“the workers remained in occupation until October 16”
The truckers are occupying no buildings. They are parking in the public street, and anyone else is free to come and go. This includes traffic—the truckers have left one lane open. Acccordingly, there is also no “blockade.”
If there is anything illegal here, it is only a parking violation.
And the government is declaring a national emergency and taking on dictatorial powers to deal with parking violations? And threatening years in prison and seizure of assets?
If you catch one side in a dispute lying, and lying consistently, it is proof they are in the wrong. If you believe truth favours your side, you will insist on it.
The government has been lying about the protests with consistency.
Dear Mr. Erskine-Smith:
The Prime Minister’s invocation of the Emergency Act is exactly the sort of dangerous overreaction of which I warned in a previous email. Use it now to suppress an inconvenient peaceful protest, and any government in future can use it to suppress dissent. Canadian democracy itself is thereby endangered, if not ended. Should this happen, the only way to restore the integrity of our institutions will be to revoke the act altogether, leaving Canada defenseless in a real emergency.
This is a reckless path that is certain to escalate tensions. There is no possible way this will not leave divisions and ill-feelings in our civil society, even if our democracy and our nation survives.
I call on you to act to pull us back from this brink.
Sincerely,
Stephen K. Roney
My understanding is that the Emergency Act must be voted on tomorrow, because the House is going away for a week, and it must be approved within seven days. Yet the Conservative House leader co9mplained this evening that he had not yet been shown the bill. It had been promised for this morning.
The obvious explanation for this is that the government is now afraid it will not pass, or afraid it is a mistake. There may be furious negotiations going on within their caucus, or with the NDP.
If it does come down, some members may find here a safe, uncontroversial “öff ramp” to vote against it—on the grounds that the government did not give them enough time to examine it.
I assumed that Justin Trudeau had solid assurance of support before he announced the Emergency Act. But the blowback seems to have gotten severe. Premiers are speaking against it. Foreign media are mocking him. Blanchet was breathing fire today in the Commons. It will not play well in Quebec.
Jagmeet Singh seems to have gotten cold feet, and now says he “may” drop his support. My own MP, Liberal, responded to my concern by saying he was examining the arguments to see if it is justified—surely implying he might vote against it.
In the meantime, the objective justification for it gets weaker. The border blockade at Windsor is over. The border blockade at Coutts is over. I hear the blockade at Denison is over. I hear the blockade at Surrey is over. What exactly is the emergency?
Yet Trudeau still sounded determined in Question Period today.
The further he pushes this, the worse it may look for him.
If he withdraws it now without a vote, having been so insistent that it was needed, it looks as though he overreacted. But even worse if he puts it to the vote, and loses. Either way, he looks foolish, reckless, and panicked.
We shall see. We may see Generalissimo Trudeau in a few days, Or we may be looking at the end of his premiership.
Has anyone else noticed how closely Justin Trudeau’s background, character, public persona, and even his actions track those of Sir Francis Bond Head, the guy who is blamed by history for provoking the Mackenzie Rebellion in Upper Canada in 1837?
History repeats itself.
And some never learn from it.
Going on Jordan Peterson's podcast is becoming the way of getting on the Canadian public record.
The legacy media is of no use. And to say only that is giving them more credit than they deserve.
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Street protest outside the Canadian Consulate in New York City. Trudeau continues to tarnish Canada's international reputation.
The Emergency Act and its predecessor, the War Measures Act, has only been invoked three times in Canadian history. The video says a bit about how our government used it the first time.
Of course the Emergency Act will pass; Trudeau would not have announced it without getting a guarantee from the NDP.
If the Emergency Act is passed, Canada is no longer a democracy.
It has been well observed, perhaps first by Thomas Jefferson, that for a democracy to work, you need a class of people who are financially self-sufficient, who do not depend on government for their daily needs. Jefferson saw freeholders as the backbone of American democracy: they could survive and feed their families indefinitely in the absence of government. Only such a class can safely organize against the current government.
This is why democracy does not work in most places until the GDP per capita hits something around $10,000. This is the point at which enough people are not living hand to mouth that they can organize.
The chronic poverty of Canadian First Nations is due to the fact that the reserve system makes everybody dependent on the band council and the federal government for their daily necessities. This makes them unable to organize to defend their interests. They have to do what they are told.
Truckers owning their own trucks are an ideal group to fight for our freedoms. Unlike people on the factory floor, or professionals obliged to buy into the system at all times, or businessmen dependent on constant liaison and permissions from government, they are relatively free agents. They can come and go, largely off the grid, moving easily with their means of livelihood to a new jurisdiction if necessary, living in their trucks if necessary. This is why they were available to defend our freedoms.
The Emergency Act seems to deliberately target financial independence from government. It gives the government the power to go into bank accounts or private transactions, and seize assets without court permission, without review, without notice and without legal recourse. It is the perfect wrecking ball to destroy democracy. Under the Emergency Act, should the government choose, nobody can afford to stand against the government of the day.
If it is invoked now, for such trivial reasons, it hardly matters if it is time-limited. Setting the precedent means it can be used again, at a moment’s notice. No organized opposition to government can now form.
If it is invoked now, as it clearly will be, the only way to restore Canadian democracy is to take the Emergency Act off the books. And exact some penalty for those who allowed it to be used.
It is obvious that Trudeau’s invocation of the Emergency Act is a misuse of the Act. Aside from war or natural disaster, the Act is to be triggered only if Canadian national security is threatened by:
(a) espionage or sabotage that is against Canada or is detrimental to the interests of Canada or activities directed toward or in support of such espionage or sabotage,
(b) foreign influenced activities within or relating to Canada that are detrimental to the interests of Canada and are clandestine or deceptive or involve a threat to any person,
(c) activities within or relating to Canada directed toward or in support of the threat or use of acts of serious violence against persons or property for the purpose of achieving a political, religious or ideological objective within Canada or a foreign state, and
(d) activities directed toward undermining by covert unlawful acts, or directed toward or intended ultimately to lead to the destruction or overthrow by violence of, the constitutionally established system of government in Canada,
but does not include lawful advocacy, protest or dissent, unless carried on in conjunction with any of the activities referred to in paragraphs (a) to (d)
In its own words, it is not to be used against lawful protest or dissent. That is exactly how it is being used now.
There been any espionage or sabotage. The government might point to the blockade of the Ambassador Bridge. But if blockade amounts to sabotage, strikes by unionized workers have also just been outlawed. Moreover, the blockade at the bridge has already been ended. There are smaller, less consequential blockages at Coutts, and one in Manitoba, but the Alberta and Manitoba governments both say there is no emergency.
There have been no threats of or use of violence against persons or property. Despite its size, the convoy has been a model of peaceful protest. The authorities may try to use the seizure of guns near the Coutts border crossing to claim (c) applies. This is pretty weak; Canadians have the right to own guns, and the possession of a gun is hardly evidence of an intent to overthrow the government. There are also claims online that this is a false flag, that the guns actually seized did not come from the convoy or the protesters. Given what the government has already resorted to, these claims are credible. We know they have been using plants and false flags.
There has been no activity for the purpose of overthrowing Canada’s constitution. The government and the NDP have made much of a memorandum, posted online demanding that the governor general dismiss the Trudeau government. However, this is not obviously in violation of the Canadian constitution, and did not call for any violence; and both the truckers and the online memorandum say it has nothing to do with the truckers.
The one charge the government might try is (b), clandestine or deceptive foreign influence. And it looks as though they are trying to do this. On the grounds that much of the money flowing into GoFundMe or GiveSendGo has been from the US.
This is simply inevitable. Nor is it obviously sinister. Nobody raised any red flags when Barack Obama endorsed Justin Trudeau a couple of elections ago. The government will have to demonstrate that, in this case, it was deceptive and clandestine. But it was not. Nobody was trying to conceal the sources of the donations. GoFundMe or GiveSendGo were following their standard practices. If they are problematic now, they were always problematic. There is no justification to declare an emergency.
As a practical matter, what does the Emergency Act accomplish? Nothing, in terms of public safety. The blockade of the Ambassador Bridge is already ended. If the Ottawa protest was ever unlawful, the Ottawa police always had the legal authority to break it up.
What is left, then, other than perhaps to seize the bank accounts and assets of any opponents of the government? To intimidate and cripple any future opposition to government power?
I suppose it does not matter that the use of the Emergency Act is illegitimate. If Parliament says it is proper, who can stop it? The Supreme Court?
But this is a serious stain on Canada’s reputation, and a serious destabilization of Canadian democracy. It threatens to throw Canada into a state of civil war. It is no trivial thing that, standing on the other side now are four provincial premiers, the Canadian Civil Liberties Association, and the last surviving signer of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.
The Emergency Act was intended for times of war. If Trudeau is now forced out of power, the stain will be on him. If he is not, Canada itself will wear the stain for the rest of history. If Canadian democracy survives.
I wonder if anyone really does not understand that the way to defeat a bad idea is to let as many people hear it as possible. This after all is the simple insight that gave us modern science: publish your results. Let anyone who can challenge them.
If anyone instead wants to suppress speech, or suppress an idea, it is because they think it is true.
It's probably of little interest, but on my afternoon walk today, in this Toronto neighbourhood, absolutely nobody I passed was wearing a mask. One guy looked at me knowingly (I was not wearing a mask either) and said hi; as if we knew each other. A few weeks ago everyone would be wearing a mask.I think ordinary people are quietly expressing their feelings in this way.
After a couple of weeks in which everyone seemed to be coming out in favour of the convoy protesters, we begin to see the counter-protests and the aggressively hostile tweets appear.
These counter-protesters are examples of the psychological phenomenon called “flying monkeys.” Watching them is informative.
These are people who could not legitimately expect to advance by their merits, but are determined to advance nonetheless. So their strategy is to seek preferment by showing unreasonable and unreasoning loyalty to whomever they think has the power to grant such preferment. They therefore become useful tools in the hands of any tyrant. Rosenkrantz and Guildenstern were Shakespearean examples.
You can almost see this in images of their little protests. “Soy boys”; “beta males.” Bitter, unattractive women. The mere physical contrast with the convoy supporters is striking. For one thing, they seem uniformly shorter.
