Oh great. So now we know eh? They may have turned a Canadian city into a police state. They may have beaten up innocent citizens, and arrested hundreds of others. But Christie Blatchford wants everybody to know that anyone who calls that infamous, is guilty of hyperbole.
For all the failures of the G20 policing and Chief Blair, whatever they turn out to be, and despite the mass detentions and the rude awakening of the middle class to the horrors of such hard truths as there being no private toilets in prisons, June 25, 26 and 27, 2010, will not live in infamy as Dec. 7, 1941, did.
Because infamy can only mean Pearl Harbour, and it wasn't Pearl Harbour, so it wasn't infamous eh?
Gawd. Crusty, Crusty, if you don't know the meaning of big words please don't use them. And as for the bit about the private toilets, kindly stick your head in one, and flush it. You old totalitarian.
The even more depressing part? Most Canadians probably agree with Blatchford. Because for all our macho bluster we are probably the most passive people on earth.
We roll over too easily. We forget too soon. The old Cons scream at the moon: those young pinkos had it coming. The politicians are mostly silent. It's like the G20 never happened.
Meanwhile in Britain.... tens of thousands of students have been protesting for weeks. It all sounds so familiar.
When did we give away the right to protest peacefully and then walk away when we had finished? When did we endorse the police holding our children for hours in freezing weather and preventing our presence, despite them having committed no crime? Why are we accepting that the police can trample on the rights of thousands because of the behaviour of a few? And why are we now having to teach our children that respect for and confidence in police officers could be naive and foolish?
But at least there the students are vowing to keep protesting.
And I LOVE these fighting words...
And don't you love these?
"Perhaps I should have known they'd put the guy in charge of the G20 in charge. Perhaps I should have been more concerned about my life..."
Oh boy. How can a kid in Britain know what so many fail to understand here?
We need more fighting words. Passivity is surrender.
If you don't defend freedom you lose it. The G20 really happened.
It's one of the most famous pictures of Canada's mission in Afghanistan. It shows members of the secretive JTF2 unit escorting three detainees off a plane at Kandahar airport, and handing them over to the U.S. military.
The date was January 21, 2002. And the picture caused an uproar in Parliament. There were fears the detainees would end up in one of the CIA's secret torture dungeons.
As a result the decision was taken to hand detainees over to Afghan authorities, notably that country's brutish National Directorate of Security (NDS). The one staffed by many former KGB agents.
But now the Wikileaks have revealed that nothing really changed. Because the CIA was running the NDS.
It’s the second-last line in a report of a March 8, 2008, meeting with Amrullah Saleh, at the time head of Afghanistan’s National Directorate of Security. And it casually notes that until 2009, the entire budget of this secret police force was provided by America’s Central Intelligence Agency.
As the New York Times, one of the handful of newspapers first given the documents by the non-profit group WikiLeaks put it: “For years, the CIA had essentially run the NDS as a subsidiary.”
Which leads to the obvious question.
Did Ottawa know this? If so, that could explain why the Conservative government is so adamant about keeping its files on the detainee issue secret.
If ministers knew at the time that their elaborate attempt to stay on the right side of the Geneva Conventions was a ruse, they would be in contravention of Canadian and international law. They could be prosecuted.
And that’s an incentive to keep things quiet.
You know, I realize that many Canadians don't care about any of the above. They'd rather not know. Just like they don't care about the fate of a Canadian child soldier who has been locked up and tortured for eight years in a place like Guantanamo.
But I believe that a country that doesn't ask questions about human rights, or one that is afraid of the truth. Or one that settles for lies or the silence of the Cons.
Isn't much of a country, and is heading for a very dark place...
And that's all I have to say. Because it's so obvious eh?
I knew that if I lived long enough in Stephen Harper's Canada I'd find out what it's like to live in a police state.
And since I live right next to the G20 Security Zone that time has finally arrived.
Police working during the G20 Summit here later this month will have rubber bullets, police dogs and sound cannons at their disposal when dealing with rowdy protesters.
And if this hurts my ears.
The larger sound cannon, which can reach 140 decibels, will be mounted on a boat and used to relay messages from Lake Ontario. The LRADs have the ability to be heard from up to 2.5 kilometers away.
The commonly accepted pain threshold is between 110 to 120 decibels.
Injured detainees will be treated in a 10-foot-by-30-foot trailer where water is provided by a hose...The role of the physician in this team is intended to deal with short, acute interventions which should result in a patient being discharged back to police custody (e.g. simple wound care). These patients would otherwise need transport to hospital.
“I am assuming that these patients are a fairly young, healthy population, and some of whom will probably claim factitious (sic) injury as part of their tactics,” the email continued.
Because this is an outrageous violation of medical ethics. And any decent doctor should refuse to be part of such a factitious fascist scheme.
You know when I first heard that the Cons planned to spend more than a billion dollars on summit security I figured it was just a way to bribe police officers with oodles of overtime. To try to buy their votes.
To try to make them forget these Cons want to kill them by scrapping the gun registry.
Even though police are using it more than ever.
Her memo noted that the number of police queries of the registry rose by almost 900,000 in 2008, to a record high of 3.4 million.
Or just another way to spend the country into debt, so they can cut government to the bloody bone.
But now I'm starting to also see it as a dress rehearsal for a police state...and the social unrest that would follow a Harper majority.
Because a government that is making a mockery out of our democratic institutions, while spending billions on security and new prisons is capable of ANYTHING.
Look I realize you need good security at a summit. I have no sympathy for violent protesters. These water cops are usually pretty friendly...
But I've said it before and I'll say it again.
Wakey wakey Canada. These hideous thuggish Cons are taking us to a place where most of us don't want to go to. A dark authoritarian jungle of a country where Parliament is a rubber stamp, theocracy rules, and human rights aren't worth the paper they're written on.
Oh well. It's going to be interesting finding out what it's like to live in a police state.
OMG.Hally hally boobah.I knew the monster was desperate. I knew he needed a makeover badly. But who knew it would be Mother Theresa?
As president of the G8 in 2010, Canada will champion a major initiative to improve the health of women and children in the world's poorest regions. Members of the G8 can make a tangible difference in maternal and child health and Canada will be making this the top priority in June...There is a pressing need for global action on maternal and child health.
This from a man who has done nothing to tackle the shameful child health problem in Canada.
In 1980, Canada's infant mortality rate was 10th lowest in the industrialized world. It now sits in 24th spot.
Factors affecting infant mortality include the growing gap between rich and poor and the child poverty rate. Where living conditions in some aboriginal communities are as miserable as many in third world countries. Where despair rules, and kids hang themselves all the time.
This from a man whose first act was to hurt women and children by destroying plans for a national daycare system. And removing the word "equality" from the Status of Women's books. Because his wacko church tells him women are subordinate, and should stay at home barefoot and pregnant. This from a sinister Con ideologue whose political thugs have been attacking decent humanitarian organizations like KAIROS, Rights and Democracy, and even the United Nations.
Toews' statement in the Jerusalem Post that Canada has "pledged $20M towards training prosecutors, judges and police and building up the Palestinian judicial sector'' is in keeping with what Canada has been doing elsewhere, notably in Haiti. There, Canada has been building prisons and training police forces as opposed to the usual forms of humanitarian aid. Because he'd rather build prisons than feed people.
Gosh.Great Ugly Leader reborn as Great Mother Leader? The strategic geniuses ,chessplayers desperate idiots in the Con War Room must think we're as stoopid as they are.
But hopefully this time it won't work. Hopefully Canadians will realize that Harper is just trying to remake his image into a softer gentler version. As he does every time he goes over the deep end, and acts like a crazed, power hungry dictator...who would do ANYTHING to win a majority.
Even if it means playing politics with the lives of women and children. And posing as a humanitarian.
Oh boy. How do we know where to find Great Ugly Mother Leader....now that Parliament is CLOSED ?
Answer: Follow the stink trail....
And while we're at it.... How do we let those desperate losers in the Con War Room know that if they think we're IDIOTS...who can be fooled by fake sincerity and staged photo-ops...we think they're MONKEYS? Answer: By softening them up with a bunch of bananas.
And giving them a camera...
The Cons as strategic geniuses?
Stephen Harper as a HUMANITARIAN? Gimme a break....or a banana. I'm hungry Great Mother Leader !!!!!
