Canadian Federal Politics Thread v5

[Yamer]

Originally Posted by flamesfever

I never felt there were any real leaders in the group, and those that tried to be, certainly seemed to lack basic leadership skills. it just seemed like an angry mob, frustrated by the pandemic restrictions, and unable to effectively articulate what it was they were really protesting against.

They did it with flags with only two words on it. I'm not sure I'll ever be convinced it was ever more complicated than simply that.

[AFireInside]

Originally Posted by flamesfever

I never felt there were any real leaders in the group, and those that tried to be, certainly seemed to lack basic leadership skills. it just seemed like an angry mob, frustrated by the pandemic restrictions, and unable to effectively articulate what it was they were really protesting against.

Had nothing to do with pandemic restrictions. The US announced their border mandate a full month before Canada did, both kicked in the following January. If they had an issue with restrictions they would have been at their provincial government.

The leadership group are the same people involved in the yellow vest protests. It was a protest against a democratically elected government by a small group, and they used the pandemic to their advantage.

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by flamesfever

I never felt there were any real leaders in the group, and those that tried to be, certainly seemed to lack basic leadership skills. it just seemed like an angry mob, frustrated by the pandemic restrictions, and unable to effectively articulate what it was they were really protesting against.

There were leaders, but at least 2 distinct groups of them. And one group of leaders had so many leaders they were all leading in seperate directions. Beyond that, the rest of the clown show was just stumbling along minute by minute taking direction from whoever they could hear over the horns, or whatever chat group could rise above being drowned out by Ram Ranch.

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by Fuzz

I believe the plan was to go to the Senate and have the senate overthrow Trudeau. They just missed the irony of going to an unelected body to overthrow a democratically elected one. That, and I'm not sure they had a plan how to convince the Senate to do that. I think they just assumed everyone was on their team. Actually I think they didn't think a lot of things all the way through.

I spoke with a senator who was in Ottawa at the time of the occupation and I don’t think the racial slurs they directed towards them(the senator) were very helpful in cultivating empathy for the don’t understand what freedom is crowd.

[Yoho]

Originally Posted by iggy_oi

I spoke with a senator who was in Ottawa at the time of the occupation and I don’t think the racial slurs they directed towards them(the senator) were very helpful in cultivating empathy for the don’t understand what freedom is crowd.

Was it by the guy waiving the Nazi flag?

[Fuzz]

Originally Posted by Yoho

Was it by the guy waiving the Nazi flag?

Friend of yours?

[iggy_oi]

Originally Posted by Yoho

Was it by the guy waiving the Nazi flag?

If there was only one guy holding a nazi flag in Ottawa as you’re implying then it’s plausible that he was involved, but according to the senator it was far from just one individual shouting racial slurs so I’m not sure how that’s relevant.

You know what I learned writing this response? My autocorrect didn’t capitalize the N in the word nazi when I typed it and I’m very glad it didn’t.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by peter12

There is a growing understanding in most business and political circles that the federal government is not capable of utilizing Canada's full state capacity anymore. Whether that is from burn-out, disillusionment, growing institutional incompetence or a combination of all of them remains to be seen.

People have to stop acting like defending this government is some sort of patriotic endeavour. Our country is growing increasingly incapable of sorting out complex issues, particularly when they overlap with provincial jurisdiction.

There is a fundamental issue of state capacity in this country - from not being able to build any kind of major industrial project on a meaningful timeline to procuring equipment for the armed forces to providing chemotherapy to cancer patients.

This is something that people of all ideological stripes should consider a priority to fix.

Record immigration levels are also going to make this worse.

The breakdowns that we are seeing with Healthcare right now are a sure sign of things to come in the future.

Unfortunately I don't see a way out of this. Provinces & the federal government just bicker over where money is spent (see recent news), we have major shortages in staff, had terrible lead times pre-COVID so now they are probably people are going to start dying bad, and because of lockdowns, health care capacity being stretched, surgeries cancelled, etc, etc.....we are going to start seeing massive rises in undetected illnesses and diseases that are going to further overwhelm the system.

Oh and obesity rates are gonna keep rising, which is going to also create an even bigger issue with health disease, diabetes, etc issues requiring massive amounts of care, funding, resources...all which we don't even have at the current moment.

As time goes on I think we will see a higher level of established families who have concerns about these issues move to provinces, towns or cities where word gets around that the care is better.

[Azure]

Originally Posted by FlamesAddiction

The convoy wasn't really a protest. The was a fringe group representing a minority of people whose stated goal was to make life painful for people until they could reverse the public health policy of a democratically elected government.

Protesting or demonstrating to show your discontent is fine, and they were allowed to do that for several weeks. A minority trying to impose dictatorial control over the government is not OK however.

Goodness sake, that is literally the definition of a political protest.

Which, we have the right to do.

The 'problem' with the protest is that is turned into a blockade of downtown Ottawa. But if it were done in a field? Big deal.

[PostandIn]

When I logged into YouTube today, there was a pop-up message from the Chief Product Officer of YouTube. It's about his/their concern about C-11 and its potential misuse by the federal government to control content delivery. An American YouTube executive directly messaging Canadian users seems like a big deal and an escalation of concern about the law.

https://blog.google/intl/en-ca/compa...youtube-yours/

"In its current form, Bill C-11 would require YouTube to manipulate these systems, and surface content according to the CRTC’s priorities, rather than the interests of Canadian users. Put into practice, this means that when viewers come to the YouTube homepage, they’re served content that a Canadian Government regulator has prioritized, rather than content they are interested in."

There's a petition from OpenMedia.org that's got about 80K signatures so far.

https://action.openmedia.org/page/11...tracking.id=tw

[edslunch]

Originally Posted by PostandIn

When I logged into YouTube today, there was a pop-up message from the Chief Product Officer of YouTube. It's about his/their concern about C-11 and its potential misuse by the federal government to control content delivery. An American YouTube executive directly messaging Canadian users seems like a big deal and an escalation of concern about the law.

https://blog.google/intl/en-ca/compa...youtube-yours/

"In its current form, Bill C-11 would require YouTube to manipulate these systems, and surface content according to the CRTC’s priorities, rather than the interests of Canadian users. Put into practice, this means that when viewers come to the YouTube homepage, they’re served content that a Canadian Government regulator has prioritized, rather than content they are interested in."

There's a petition from OpenMedia.org that's got about 80K signatures so far.

https://action.openmedia.org/page/11...tracking.id=tw

That makes it sound more ominous than it is. I assume the prioritization would be for Canadian content in general, not specific content that the government picked.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Originally Posted by AFireInside

Did you read their M.O.U.?

The MOU called on the Governor General and the Senate of Canada to form a new government with the protesters themselves. Sounds like force to me.

First of all, no, of course not. I'm not reading that - what a waste of time that would be. It would be like... I don't know, like reading Pepsifree's posts.

Second, if that sounds like force to you, you don't know what force is in this context. If it involves "calling on" someone to do something - unless the something is, "get a bunch of weapons and point them at people to get them to do what you want" - it's not force. They're "calling on" the GG and Senate to do things those people don't have the power to do, which makes them stupid, but demands to do insane things are, ultimately, just a bunch of hot air.

[AFireInside]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

First of all, no, of course not. I'm not reading that - what a waste of time that would be. It would be like... I don't know, like reading Pepsifree's posts.

Second, if that sounds like force to you, you don't know what force is in this context. If it involves "calling on" someone to do something - unless the something is, "get a bunch of weapons and point them at people to get them to do what you want" - it's not force. They're "calling on" the GG and Senate to do things those people don't have the power to do, which makes them stupid, but demands to do insane things are, ultimately, just a bunch of hot air.

Blackmail is considered force, doesn't require guns as far as I know. Force doesn't need to be physical or at gun point.

When they are trying to force the government form a new government by occupying a city, and borders then I guess I just disagree. It wasn't like they were asking if we could look at different ways to govern, they weren't trying to have discussions because they were trying to pretend it was about mandates. They tried to gain leverage and force the government to act. Let's not pretend they were sending in a petition to get an alleged sex offender to resign, it went way beyond that.

I may agree with you if they weren't occupying a city and borders.That's not asking for anything, that's demanding, and trying to use force.

Was it a stupid plan? Of course it was, they aren't smart people, that doesn't change anything.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

Force absolutely does need to be physical... I mean, to be clear, I'm just approaching this from a lawyer's perspective, and thinking about how a judge would interpret that word as used in the context of the Criminal Code provisions that were quoted.

[PeteMoss]

Originally Posted by edslunch

That makes it sound more ominous than it is. I assume the prioritization would be for Canadian content in general, not specific content that the government picked.

Agreed - I can see why YouTube wouldn't like it, but we've had rules in place for Radio and TV forever.

That said - YouTube is also a different animal where theoretically where you are from doesn't matter and there aren't gate keepers so being Canadian next door to the giant US is less of an issue compared to radio or tv where networks have so much control.

[AFireInside]

Originally Posted by CorsiHockeyLeague

Force absolutely does need to be physical... I mean, to be clear, I'm just approaching this from a lawyer's perspective, and thinking about how a judge would interpret that word as used in the context of the Criminal Code provisions that were quoted.

I get what your saying, but it does not need to be physical force. Extortion is considered use of force and it doesn't require a physical threat. Extortion can be threats of violence, or things like reputational harm.

Maybe there's something I'm missing here like a very specific definition for the EA, but a physical threat isn't required for something to be considered a use of force.

[CorsiHockeyLeague]

I don't know what provision of the EA you're referring to; I was referring to s.59 of the criminal code which was quoted earlier. In the context of the Criminal Code, the use of force requires at least some sort of physical touching of someone else. That's my understanding anyway, I don't do criminal law.

[Maritime Q-Scout]

I don't know what C-11 says, but if it's to ensure Canadian content in the algorithm, meh. I have no real issue with that.

It's not like the YouTube algorithm is biased and skews ultra-right.

I suppose the CTRC is just ensuring we get videos about Convoy "Protesters" rather than January 6th "Protesters".

[GGG]

Some interesting stuff out of the Convoy commission today. They are now in the policy phase where they are gathering opinions on how to modernize the acthttps://beta.ctvnews.ca/national/pol...1_6174928.html

You have the last two csis directors recommending that they remove references to the csis act and redefine emergency. You also have a former department of Justice lawyer for csis saying they didn’t meet the act as currently written.

Elcock said CSIS would need to interpret that definition very differently as an intelligence agency than cabinet would when it comes to deciding whether to declare a national emergency.
He said CSIS interprets the definition in terms of the limitations on its activities as an intelligence service. "None of those things are relevant to the discussions of cabinet or to the issues that a cabinet might debate," he testified.
Fadden said the CSIS definition is, appropriately, very narrow and precise.
"What this has to do with the declaration of a public order emergency escapes me entirely," Fadden said.
Both argued the government should redefine national security threats in the Emergencies Act, and could expand that to include threats to the economy and those posed by climate change.

Prof. Leah West, a national security law expert with Carleton University and a former Department of Justice lawyer for CSIS, argued Wednesday the protests did not meet the legal threshold.
"We should ask ourselves whether unlawful and even violent protests typically give rise to what we call a national security threat under the law in this country? Did we label the G8 and G20 protests in Toronto a national security or terrorist threat?" she posed to the commission.
"Similarly, we have never labelled blockades and other non-violent but illegal means of obstructing critical infrastructure as terrorism."

Should be interesting the recommended changes coming out of this commission are.

[Yoho]

https://twitter.com/user/status/1598112702320312320

Can’t wait for the next Emergency Act to be authorized based on climate change.